


Dangerous Waters

by ohmyfae



Category: Final Fantasy XV
Genre: Alternate Universe - Pirate, M/M, Multi, Sex, Some depictions of violence, unnamed character deaths
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-06-15
Updated: 2017-07-14
Packaged: 2018-11-14 15:23:31
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 14
Words: 30,568
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11210847
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ohmyfae/pseuds/ohmyfae
Summary: Regis Lucis Caelum is the commander of The Queen's Crystal, a frigate that protects merchant ships, carries the occasional cargo, and engages in light piracy against the oppressive Niflheim Empire.Gladio, son of Regis' second in command and best friend to the commander's daydreaming son, is assigned to the boats meant to board an Imperial galley off a smuggler's cove near Tenebrae. There, he finds a young doctor bearing the brand of a traitor to the Empire, sitting beside the still warm body of the galley captain...(A fill for the kinkmeme!)





	1. Chapter 1

_The Queen’s Crystal_ was an old, three-masted frigate, not unlike the ones that escorted merchant ships to Altissia. She cut through the sea off Cape Caem with surprising ease, the deceptive strength of her sails making up for the weight of guns and mortar, and her rigging crawled with the shadowy figures of her crew. Coarse marks on the side of the ship showed where carvings had been removed, though anyone looking close could see the discolored shape of them against the stained, weather-worn wood. Gold bands around the base of the masts had been painted black, useless ornamentation on the shutters of the gun decks scrubbed off, and the flags that snapped in the wind flew the colors of Accordo and Tenebrae, and the red, poorly sewn crest of Niflheim. The only sign of the ship it had once been was in the name, and the wooden form of a woman at the fore, holding a crystal in both hands. 

Regis Lucis Caelum, commander of the Crystal, sat back in his chair and propped his feet up on the narrow window behind his desk. Weak light, thick with dust, made the sharp lines of his uniform look faded and worn, and the silvery streaks in his hair shone as he tilted his head into a grey patch of morning.

Outside, he could hear the call of a familiar voice rolling over the sea.

 _A hundred years is a very long time,_ cried the man. Behind him, in time with the creak of ropes and the thud of sailors pumping water out of the hull, came the chorus of the morning watch. 

_Oh, yes, oh!_

Clarus Amicitia, Regis’ first mate and oldest friend, sighed and resumed rolling out his papers on the desk.

 _A hundred years is a fucking long time,_ cried the voice again. Regis raised an eyebrow.

_A hundred years ago!_

“If only _my_ son could be as pleased with the morning watch as yours,” Regis said, looking over his shoulder. Clarus glanced up, and while an outside observer would spot nothing but a grim and forbidding man in his fifties, Regis could see the smile in his eyes. 

“Gladio has a happy nature, thank the gods,” Clarus said. “Your Noctis will find his feet one day.”

“Hopefully _soon,_ ” Regis said. He slipped his own feet off the sill and turned to face his friend. “Out with it, Clarus. It’s too nice of a morning for you to grumble in silence.”

Clarus traced a thick finger along the merchant lines that led to the closest port off the coast of Tenebrae. “The Empire’s been closing in on the smugglers through Accordo, and you know it, Reg.” He ran a hand over the back of his bald crown. “Two ships down since spring, and when we were in Galdin for those damn sails, I heard that High Commander Ravus has been overseeing an inquiry into escort vessels. Like ours, Regis. If we get too close to the Empire now…”

“We have a duty,” Regis said, in the soft, steady voice that brooked no argument. He’d seen the signs himself. Trade between the Republic of Accordo and the annexed nation of Tenebrae had been stilted of late, and Imperial warships had been spotted off the coast of their major ports. It made supplying the rebels of Tenebrae, who still fought the Emperor at every turn, a dangerous enterprise. For the Crystal, whose crew was known to have no love for the Empire, it might one day prove fatal. 

But not today. Today, Regis had plans to keep their course for the cove, where a galley from the Empire was due to pass by on its way along the coast. Boxes on deck held unmarked flags and sheets to cover the Crystal’s name, and young men and women slept curled next to their guns, weapons glinting in the dark. 

“They can’t be allowed to place a choke-hold on what free nations remain,” Regis said, and gently slid the map from Clarus’ hands. “The Lucis Caelums may be a relic of an ancient line, but this crew is loyal, and our ship has _teeth._ ” He leaned back in his chair, letting the creak and thud of the ship wash over him. 

“It’s time the Empire remembered this.”

 

\---

 

“Hey, Gladio!” 

Gladiolus Amicitia squinted up into the glare of the early morning sun, and caught sight of a young woman dressed in yellow and salt-stained blue. She whistled and pointed imperiously down to her left. Curious, he followed her path, and cursed darkly. Noctis, his friend and the son of the commander, was supposed to be fixing the rigging midway up the foremast. Instead, he was simply hanging on, one arm slung idly over a square of rope, gazing off into the clear distance. 

Technically, it wasn’t Gladio’s job to make sure that Noct did _his._ He could, without breaking any outright order, leave him for his father to find. He could let him hang there all day if he wanted, sit back and watch the next round of sailors climb the rigging to find him dreaming in a tangle of frayed ropes. 

No one would blame him for it. 

Gladio sighed and shoved his polishing cloth in his back pocket. He slid down the rigging in short bursts, and navigated the trail of shoddy ropework that was Noct at his most distracted. At least Noct could tell he was coming—the dark-haired young man looked back at him with a slow, lazy smile, and waved an arm. 

“Hey, Gladio,” he said.

“Hey, yourself,” Gladio told him. “The hell is this, Noct?” He gestured to Noct’s morning handiwork, and Noct shrugged. “This’ll get someone killed.”

“ _You_ made it okay,” Noct said. “Besides, it’s a nice day, and it’s _boring_ on morning watch.”

“Don’t tell me you fucked up just so I could join you,” Gladio said. Noct gave him a shifty, slightly shamefaced look, and Gladio groaned. “Fucking hell, Noct. Fine. You get started on this end, I’ll meet you in the middle.”

He had to admit, for all that Noct could be a frustrating, sarcastic little shit with the mind of a daydreamer and a tendency to fight like a bag of cats when cornered, Gladio _liked_ being on watch with him. Not that he’d say it, of course—Noct had been placed on a week of morning watches for talking back to his dad right in front of Cor Leonis, the man in charge of the sailors who operated the cannons. This was supposed to be a punishment, not a chance to joke around with a friend. 

But ever since they’d parted ways with their sister ship, the Glaive, which was run by most of the men and women Noct and Gladio had grown up with, the Crystal felt almost… lonely. Which made no sense. Gladio _never_ had privacy, not unless he was out on the masts, like now. 

Ah. He looked to Noct, who was staring off towards the east again. That explained it. 

“Let’s break out a deck of cards and play King’s Knight when the watch is over,” Gladio shouted, over a gust of wind that made the sails ripple with a sound of thunder. 

“What?”

He shouted again, and Noct smirked. 

“Need four to play that one!” he shouted back. 

“Only if you ain’t tryin’ hard enough,” Gladio cried, and Noct leaned over to kick him in the back of the shin. 

Noct was right, though. By the time the next watch was called and they’d dropped to the deck, they were too tired to do more than head down to the kitchens. They snuck back up to the quarterdeck towards the rear of the ship, where they hid behind boxes of linen and rope too worn to be repaired. There, they pushed cards around with their shoes, talking in low voices as the crew of the Queen’s Crystal moved about them, guiding the ship towards the distant cove of Tenebrae. 

 

\---

 

In a galley ship anchored near the border of Tenebrae, a young man was pushed to his knees. 

He was tall, long-limbed and slender, and while hunger had given an edge to his cheeks and a shadow to his bright green eyes, his arms were wiry with muscle. He lifted his head to turn a cool gaze to the captain, who scowled and spat on the warped wood of the floor.

“They say you’re a physician.” 

The man licked his lips. “If that is what they say, then it _must_ be true.”

He heard the crack of the captain’s hand before he felt the blow, and blood pooled hot under his tongue. 

“You aren’t in a position to play games with me, boy.” The captain halted a foot away from him, arms clasped behind his back. “Is it true?”

“Y-yes,” the man said. His voice was hoarse, and he swallowed down the taste of copper. “Yes, I was.”

“At least _one_ of them is useful,” the captain muttered. “Alright. Consider yourself promoted, boy. Take him to Loqi’s old quarters,” he told the guard who stood at the door. “If the reports from the capital are true, we’ll need him. And make sure he doesn’t leave. Chain him if you have to.”

The man was hauled to his feet. As he rose, his threadbare shirt slid over one shoulder, and he shivered despite the midday heat. Just above his bicep, black as pitch, was a wide circular brand in the shape of a dragon. 

Ignis Scientia, fugitive from Tenebrae and prisoner of the Empire, was dragged out the door and into the light.


	2. Chapter 2

It was remarkably easy for a merchant vessel, even a well-marked frigate like the Crystal, to become a pirate ship in times of need. When the third hour past sunset was called, young deckhands pattered noiselessly along the decks, stuffing bells with cloth, dousing lamps, and hurriedly blackening metal with soot. The name on the port side of the ship was covered, the statue of the queen draped in dirty linen, and the flags and banners were all taken down. Most merchant ships-turned-pirate kept to a simple black flag, but Regis was nothing if not dramatic, and a white skull hung in the center of the cloth, grinning wickedly. 

Gladio crouched next to Noctis on one of the small rowboats being lowered over the side of the ship. The men and women above them took care not to speak or lower them too quickly, as sound carried far over open water, and the Nif galley that was their target was close enough to strike. Gladio pushed back on the hull when the boat threatened to knock into it, and he took a seat at the oar when they finally hit the water. 

Crawling up to the forward-most part of the boat, Noct gave the signal to advance. 

They moved agonizingly slow, and Gladio wondered, not for the first time, why the commander had assigned them such an easy target. The galleys that moved from the coast of Tenebrae to the southern provinces were common, now, though they were usually too well guarded for anyone to bother to target them. Which was strange, really, because here this one was, double-oared and with a fine sail for catching the wind, dead in the water. 

Noctis tensed. He raised his hand and twisted it three times. The crews on the other boats looked to them, and Noct flashed his hand three times again. Gladio scanned the galley, and could barely make out three men on deck, indistinct against the cloudy sky.

Noct might’ve been a terror with a needle and a disaster at morning watch, but there was a reason he was taken out on boarding missions. 

They waited until the men moved out of view, and Noct gave the signal to advance again, with an added gesture that meant _at deliberate speed._ They timed their strokes with the beat of the waves rocking against the galley, and they were nearly in range to throw their grappling hooks over the side when Noct, startling everyone with a jolt of terror, let out a cry. 

“Guns!” he shouted. The word had barely left his mouth before the others saw what he had—torches all along the galley were lit, revealing sailors along the rail at all sides. They’d been spotted, but Noct’s warning gave them enough time to raise the metal slabs lining the sides of each boat, creating an impromptu shield. 

This was no time to be cautious. Gladio’s boat was the first to arrive at the side of the galley, and he heard a shot, a scream in his ear, and a thunk of metal as one of his men fell. 

“This was planned!” Noct shouted. “One of you fuckers needs to light a signal flare!”

“Pretty sure the commander knows!” Cindy cried, from the boat rapidly approaching on the right. Behind them, the Crystal came into view around the edge of the cove, black flag flying high. Noct growled and grabbed one of the grappling hooks from the floor of the boat. 

“Gladio,” he said. Gladio nodded and grabbed his own. Grapples shot out over the edge of the vessel, and as the men and women on the other end swung themselves out to climb up the hull, their mates raised heavy guns to cover them. Gladio struggled to climb faster than Noct, knowing he’d jump into the thick of the fighting with no concern for his own skin, and dragged his sword from its sheath to slash at the hands of the man trying to wrench the hook off the rail. 

A Nif shrieked as Noct landed on him, thrusting his sword into the hapless sailor’s lungs. 

“Probably a trap!” Noct shouted. Gladio kicked a man over the side, and gave his friend a look older than the earth itself. 

“Oh, you _think?_ ”

 

\---

 

Ignis was used to maintaining his composure in times of stress. He’d seen enough of it at his parents’ sides, learning the basics of wartime surgery as the rebellion against Niflheim pushed into the outlying cities of Tenebrae. He’d amputated his first limb at the age of fourteen, learned how to extract shrapnel at fifteen. He knew in intimate detail the workings of the human body and all the ways in which it might, at any given time, break down. Blood and sweat and furious cursing was a staple in his life for so long that silence seemed deceptive. 

By the time he was nineteen, he’d learned enough to know that when his parents were run through during a raid on their clinic, there would be no saving them. He knew enough to try and keep the fresh brand on his arm as clean as possible while he lay in the holding cells of the port city of Versun, waiting for judgment. He knew not to speak when the judge asked him if he would like to counter the argument of the prosecutor. It hadn’t mattered. He would be dead soon enough, either of sickness or starvation or infection on the way to wherever traitors to the Empire were kept, and he would not give them the satisfaction of hearing his voice shudder and break. 

Now, he listened to the crackle of gunshots overhead, and placed his hand on the shoulder of the man on his cot. 

“If you lie still, I can save the arm,” he said. The previous doctor who worked out of the small alcove in the hold had clearly seen no need for anything to dull the pain beyond straight alcohol, and Ignis was loathe to poison a man who wasn’t in danger of dying. He worked quickly, letting the screams, the grunts of pain, and the crash of water fade into the distance. 

He was nearly done when a shaking hand broke his concentration, and he looked up to find the captain staggering over the sailor in Ignis’ care. 

“Shrapnel,” he said, in a hoarse voice. “Some little blonde with a rifle.”

“You’ll survive another minute,” Ignis began, and the captain roared, making him jump. He heard the clink of the chain that fastened his ankle to the floor of the alcove, and couldn’t mask the revulsion in his eyes as he turned to the captain. His previous patient was fleeing for the ladder, and the captain collapsed onto the cot. 

“You’ll do your job,” he said, “or I’ll have you drowned with the others.”

 _Drowned?_ Ignis thought. He froze. He must not have heard them fall—He’d heard of the practice, of crew throwing enslaved people or criminals overboard to prevent them from being taken by boarding pirates, but the thought of it actually _happening,_ of someone being monstrous enough to give the order… He tried to steady his breathing. 

Around them, the wall shuddered with the force of gunfire. The hold was already taking in water, and Ignis could hear screams overhead, sharper now. Closer.

On the cot before him, the captain groaned out a curse and rolled his eyes, fingers clutching at the air. 

Slowly, with great care, Ignis Scientia picked up his knives.

 

\---

 

The trap took all of ten minutes to spring. Cindy Aurum shouted the alarm as a man-of-war appeared around the other side of the cove, trying to block the Crystal in between it and the galley. He heard shouts from the ship, and the Crystal turned sharply as the cannons were prepared. The first blast of cannon fire sounded as Noctis gave the order to continue. 

“Doesn’t matter if we retreat now!” he shouted. “We’ll be dead anyways! Secure the prisoners first, then we head for the beach.” 

Gladio frowned. The prisoners, right. If Noct had a fault—and gods, he had more than enough for anyone—the most glaring was the fact that he was, in the end, soft-hearted. Oh, he was good at killing, gods knew Gladio had taught him that, but the moment they heard the captain give the order to throw _the prisoners_ overboard, Gladio knew that they weren’t going to leave until every Niff on the galley was dead. 

Noct prevented a man from throwing a blonde, dazed-looking boy his own age over the edge, and frowned at the chain linking him to a line of other, similarly shell-shocked men and women. He broke the chain with his sword and yanked the blonde away from the rail. 

“It’s almost done,” he told Gladio. “Check below decks.”

“As you wish, princess!” Gladio shouted. Noct flipped him a rude gesture, and the blonde at his arm laughed. 

The hold was dark, compact, and _foul._ The prisoners had already been escorted up from what Gladio could see, but he ran through it anyways, heading for the one source of light towards the end of the rows. There were figures there, silhouetted against a candle flame, and when Gladio reached them at last, he found himself lowering his sword.

Sitting on a stool next to a man on a makeshift cot was a young man with light brown hair, a pale, wan face, and hands dark with blood.

Gladio took in the mess on the cot, the blood soaking the man’s arms and shirtfront, and the chain snaking to a ring on the floor from the cuff on his ankle. He sloshed through the debris of the galley and stopped just at the edge of the alcove, as the man rose from his stool and held out a short, thin knife. He had to crouch like Gladio, being too tall for the low roof, but there was a wild glint to his eyes that Gladio had seen too many times in battle to ignore. 

“I ain’t gonna hurt you,” he said, in what he hoped was a soothing voice. 

“Says the man wielding a weapon,” the man said, “Covered in someone else’s blood.”

Gladio tried for a smile. “We talking about you or me, here?”

The man lowered the knife. It rose again as Gladio took a step forward. “Who are you? Pirates, I assume? From Accordo? _Lucis?_ ”

“No one calls it Lucis anymore,” Gladio said. The man lifted one shoulder in a helpless shrug, and Gladio closed the gap between them anyways, knife be damned. The man lashed out before Gladio’s hands found his, squeezing just tight enough to get him to drop the blade. Gladio could feel the heat of pain flare along his cheekbone. 

“We ain’t here to kill you,” Gladio said, and stopped short. He was close enough now to see that the man on the cot was wearing the uniform of a Niflheim captain, which had been opened at the collar to reveal the peppering of shrapnel on his chest. The shrapnel was new, but what had killed him, what had covered the man in Gladio’s hands with blood, was the fresh, gaping wound on his neck. 

Gladio turned to the man in chains, who stared at him levelly, lips pinched tight. 

“Let’s get you out of here,” Gladio said. He ducked down and gripped the hilt of his sword. “Pull the chain.” The man shifted, and Gladio slammed the butt of his sword down on the weak chain that held him to the floor. It snapped, and the man shook out his leg, letting the rest slither loose. 

“We’ll deal with the cuff when you’re on the Crystal,” Gladio told him. 

The man narrowed his eyes. “The _Crystal?_ ” he asked. “The _Queen’s_ Crystal?”

“You’ve heard of us?” Gladio tried to smile like he wasn’t standing at the scene of a murder. “Good. You’ll be right at home.” He held out his hand, and the man took it, blood-slick fingers staining Gladio’s skin. 

The galley was won by the time Gladio and the man climbed up the ladder, and Noct was helping prisoners into the waiting boats. 

“We got the signal to board anyways,” he said, when Gladio approached him. “Shit, what happened to you?”

“Would you like a list?” asked the man behind Gladio, wrenching his hand free. Noct bared his teeth in a grin.

“Hey, I like _you._ Get in the boat. Dad’s sent us a warning—we’ve got a ten minute window to get to the leeward side and climb up, or we’re dead to him. Come on, Gladio.” He leapt down, and the man climbing into their boat gave Gladio a searching look. 

“Gladio?” he asked. 

“Sit,” Noct said. He always became more energetic right after a fight, and he was brimming with battle fervor, hands jittery on the bow of their boat. “We’re gonna beat the shit out of some Nifs.”

“Delightful,” the man muttered, and Noct laughed, the sound disappearing under the crash and boom of cannons on the water.


	3. Chapter 3

Gladio and Noct’s boat was halfway to the Crystal when cannon and mortar fire stuttered out like a roll of terrible thunder. Noct whooped— _They’re using the chain shots!_ he cried—as cannonballs joined by a length of chain made mince of the rigging and sails. For a moment after there was silence and smoke, then an overwhelming crack made the escaped prisoners wince, and even Gladio cheered as the mizzenmast of the war ship crashed over the main mast, rendering the ship unable to escape. 

“Those masts’ll be damn expensive to fix,” a woman in their boat said. “Don’t think the loot from the galley is enough to pay for it.”

The man Gladio found spoke up, his voice cold. “So you’ll be selling us,” he said. The woman who’d spoken before stared at him, baffled. 

“We don’t deal in slaves,” Gladio said, watching for the flag of surrender. The enemy ship had stopped firing, but despite the flurry of movement on the deck, the flag of Niflheim flew alone. “They’re done for,” he added. “Why aren’t they—“

“Fire,” said the blonde Noct had rescued, just a beat before Noct said the word himself. He blushed at Noct’s probing gaze, and pointed to the man-of-war. “There’s smoke, in the hold. You can see it.”

“Yes, _I_ can,” Noct said, the edge of jealousy creeping into his voice. “But you’re saying you—“

“Shut it, princess,” Gladio hissed. They watched in growing horror as explosions of fire, wood, and metal burst one after another below the decks, turning the sea a sickening shade of orange. So _that_ was what the rush of movement had been about. Gladio could just spot a row of lifeboats bobbing in the current behind the war ship as fire took the hold, likely spurred on by oil or blasting powder. 

“There are still people in there,” Noct said, all enthusiasm gone. He gripped the tangle of rope at the front of their boat. “Dad can send out a rescue.”

“Noct,” Gladio said, in a warning tone. Noct ground his teeth together. 

“Most of them are probably kids,” he said. “They’re… gods, they’re jumping in, if we send a boat now—“

Gladio said nothing. If they were too close when the ship sank, it was unlikely that any of them would survive. The blonde next to Noct tentatively slid a hand over his, and Noct grabbed it unconsciously, knuckles whitening as the man-of-war began its devastating descent into the waves. 

“What a waste,” someone said. 

If anyone saw the furious tears in Noctis’ eyes, they knew enough not to mention it. The young man beside Noct lifted a hand to his cheek, and Noct turned aside, his breath gone short and ragged. 

“Hey,” the blonde said, softly.

They boarded The Queen’s Crystal in silence. Some of the prisoners were sobbing, disbelieving that a pirate ship wouldn’t simply sell them at the next port, but the man Gladio had found examined the chaos on deck, the blasted rigging and the enemy lifeboats waving the white flags of surrender at last, and gave no indication of fear or concern. His face was a mask, Gladio realized—a well-constructed one, but a mask nonetheless, and he wondered what had happened to make someone his own age go so quiet and hard. 

Clarus strode forward, sword at his hip, mouth working like he wanted to bawl someone out but hadn’t found the lucky soul just yet. Half the sailors straightened to attention. 

“So they _were_ dealing in human cargo,” he said, voice thick with disgust. “Very well. We’re taking on water, we have those damn Nifs to deal with, and I just had to watch a war ship go slipping through our fingers. Anyone who does not hop to will be placed in the stocks ‘til the _sun_ dies. Take these ladies and gentlemen below, and make certain that any injured are seen to by Sania. I will—“

“My apologies,” said the man by Gladio. Clarus stopped, and Gladio tried not to gape at his nerve, interrupting Clarus at his most tense. “I’m a doctor. I can offer my assistance, if needed…”

“Then well met, sir,” Clarus said, without even pausing to take in the man’s bloody state. “Gladio, show him the way, and then report back. The rest of you…”

Gladio grabbed the man by the elbow before he could say anything else, and helped him down one of the ladders into the lower decks. The infirmary was just behind the storerooms for the kitchen and carpenters, but Gladio had to lead them past two gun rooms first. The ship was still a mess of shouting, pounding feet, and the stink of gunpowder and smoke down below, and Gladio’s eyes were watering by the time they made it to Professor Sania’s infirmary. 

Professor Sania wasn’t exactly the sort of doctor they _needed_ on the ship, but she was leagues better than her predecessor, who believed a handsaw and a floor covered in sawdust was enough to solve any injury. The infirmary was woefully full, with Sania seeing to the gravest injuries while her assistant, Talcott, ran around looking after the others the best he could. Gladio gave the boy a weak smile—he had a soft spot for Talcott, who had only turned ten last year and hero-worshipped the commander—and waved for Sania’s attention. 

“Ah, Gladiolus!” she said, eyes wide behind her thick-rimmed glasses. “Not dead yet, I see. Very good. Very good. And who’s this? Don’t tell me, walking corpse? That’s a lot of blood, honey.”

“Most of it is not mine, thankfully,” the man said smoothly. He ran his fingers through his hair, pushing his bangs back. “I'm a doctor—I worked on the warfront in Tenebrae for—“

“Good enough for me,” Sania said. “You know how to set bones?”

“Yes, of course.”

“Good, meet Julia. Julia, this is your new doctor.” 

Gladio watched as the man knelt before the woman Sania had indicated. He spoke softly to her, too quiet for Gladio to hear, and his fingers pressed down on the skin of her arm as he tested for pain. The woman flinched, and he lifted his free hand to brush back her hair, his voice soothing, gentle. 

Too late, he remembered his orders to report back. He cursed under his breath and booked it out of the infirmary, leaving the man behind with the wounded. 

By the time Gladio made it back, the commander was out on the quarterdeck, looking down on the sullen and shackled Nif sailors arranged in loose lines before him. Gladio’s father caught his eye and gestured, and Gladio moved to his right side, trying to ignore the way the salt air stung the cut on his left cheek. The commander looked mad enough to _kill,_ and Gladio didn’t want to draw any more attention to himself than necessary. 

“…not an unreasonable man,” Regis was saying, addressing the officers who glowered darkly at their feet. “You will be sent to shore on your lifeboats, where you will, I am sure, find that the Tenebraean countryside will do a world of good for your health.” He smiled mirthlessly. “Of course, the shackles may prove troublesome, but you’re so _creative,_ I see, that it shouldn’t be too much of a bother.”

“Through enemy territory?” one of the officers snapped, looking up at Regis with a face twisted in rage. Regis raised his brows as though he’d only just considered the possibility. 

“Oh, yes, that’s true,” he said. “Your enlisted men should pass for unlucky victims at the least, but you officers with your fine uniforms… No, we can’t have the rebels mistaking you for the _enemy._ ” He looked to those of his crew standing guard, and raised his voice. “Strip them.”

Afterwards, as the cursing, slouching crew of the war ship were sent off to a chorus of jeers, there came a shout from the gun decks. Smoke billowed over the edge of the ship as the cannons fired, with devastating accuracy, on the galley that lay in wait just before the shore. The men in the boats cried out in dismay, and Regis’ smile widened. 

“Since they enjoy seeing their own ships go down,” he said. Gladio shivered. He knew that Regis had a vindictive streak, but seeing the result of it was more than a little harrowing. 

The rest of the night passed in a blur. Gladio barely had time to speak to Noct, who was kept as busy as he was, scaling the rigging and repairing what he could just so they could clear the cove and turn into a respectable ship again. Gladio was put to work pumping out water and caulking holes, and he fell into his hammock at the end of his shift with no desire but for the sweet escape of unconsciousness. 

An hour of shifting, grumbling, and frustrated groaning later, Gladio rolled to his feet and stalked to the kitchens. He begged a few rations off the cooks, who muttered but didn’t object, and bundled up some bread, cheese, and dried pork. He made a beeline for the infirmary, which was still well-lit despite the late hour, and emerged to find both Sania and the doctor still at work. Talcott was asleep in a corner, snoring faintly, and they were seeing to the last of their patients, blinking quickly in the lamplight. 

“You two remember what food tastes like?” he asked, and Sania flapped a hand at him. The man from the galley tied off a line of stitches over his patient’s shoulder and reached for a vial and brush to clean around the wound. 

“I believe young Talcott gave us dinner earlier,” he said, in the same vague, dreamy tone that Noct used when he was slacking off. 

“Yeah, well, it’s almost dawn,” Gladio said. He set a portion of his haul aside for Sania, and waited until the man was done with his patient before passing over the rest. The man stared at it, then up at the professor. 

“I’ll take the rest of them,” she said. “Get some meat on those bones.”

The man scrubbed a hand over his face and peered at Gladio. 

“That cut needs cleaning,” he said, gesturing to Gladio’s cheek. 

“For gods’ sakes, man, eat first.” Gladio glanced around the infirmary. “You know what, let’s take this to the deck. There’s a spot Noct and I—Noct’s the guy with the black hair, son of the commander—staked out a while back. Won’t be in the way, I promise.” 

“I suppose…”

“Come on, doctor.” Gladio helped the man to his feet, and practically dragged him out of the infirmary. 

The night above the deck was bright with stars. The black flag was gone, metal fittings polished and the cloth coverings tucked away, and the first night watch climbed about the rigging as they mended sails and caulked chips in the masts. The two of them settled down in Noct and Gladio’s hideaway, and Gladio noted that the man was trying not to seem too eager to get his hands on the bread and cheese. 

“Never gave me your name,” Gladio said. The man frowned, having just bit down on a piece of bread, and Gladio smirked at him. 

“Ignis.”

Strange. Gladio felt like he _knew_ that name, somehow. “Oh, I see. Like fire?" Ignis rolled his eyes and nodded. "So. Ignis. What’s a doctor doing as a prisoner of Niflheim?”

“What’s a ship like the Crystal doing moonlighting in piracy?” Ignis asked. Gladio shrugged and stretched out his legs. 

“Gotta do something to fight the Empire,” he said. He paused, and the words welled up, unbidden, from the tight knot in his chest that had yet to unravel. “That man, in the galley…”

“I missed this,” Ignis said. He crossed his legs, and Gladio saw that while his cuff had been removed some time that afternoon, his feet were bare, and his clothes were filthy with dirt and grime. The blood on his shirt had gone rust-brown, and the moonlight made his shirtfront look black as ink. “Being out on the water. It wasn’t the same below. Just rowing, and darkness.” 

“Well, that’s done,” Gladio said. “We’ll be letting you off at Galdin, probably. Unless you want to stay. We could use a good doctor.”

“I’m not _that_ good of one,” Ignis said, looking down at the blood on his shirt. He closed his eyes. “Gladio. I don’t think that—“

“Gladiolus.”

Oh, hell. Gladio and Ignis both started as Regis Lucis Caelum appeared before them, smoky eyes crinkling in amusement at Gladio’s momentary panic. He was in his evening-wear, all black and worn at the edges, and he stepped back as the two young men scrambled to their feet. 

“No need to stand on ceremony,” Regis informed them. He smiled at Ignis, with none of the calculated fury that he’d directed towards the enemy officers. In this light, he seemed ordinary, just Noct’s father taking an evening stroll on deck. “I take it you’re the doctor my son informed me of? It was good of you to offer your services, when you had every right to focus on your own recovery.”

“I could hardly refuse, sir,” Ignis said. 

Something in Regis shifted—His smile dropped, his eyes lost their good-natured crinkling at the edges, and he moved forward, staring at Ignis carefully. Ignis, in turn, wore the same bland mask Gladio had seen before, on the deck. 

“Good gods,” Regis said. He held Ignis by the shoulders, suddenly pale. “Corrin? Corrin Scientia?”

“No, sir,” Ignis said. He was bracing himself, Gladio could tell, his shoulders back and his hands clenched at his sides. “That would be my father.” 

Gladio looked from Regis to Ignis, utterly poleaxed. The commander raised a hand to Ignis’ cheek, and Gladio saw a crack appear in the young man’s calm facade—a twitch of muscle at his lips, a narrowing of the eyes. 

“Ignis,” Regis said, in a voice that threatened to break. “ _Astrals,_ it’s good to have you home.”


	4. Chapter 4

Gladiolus Amicitia was six years old, and he’d never hated anyone in his life as much as he hated Ignis Scientia. 

It wasn’t just that Ignis was smart. Gladio was pretty keen himself—He could read half the children’s books in the first two shelves of his father’s study, he could count well enough to know how much candy to buy when he was on shore, and Mr. Caelum said he played recorder so well that he should go _outside_ and let the sailors on deck listen for a while. He even knew most of the easier knots. 

But no, Ignis was _clever._ He was the son of the ship doctors, and walked around with books under his arms and ink on his fingers like that made him _better_ than everyone, somehow. He talked like an adult, using words he probably made up and none of their parents wanted to tell him weren’t real, and he had a way of _looking_ at Gladio, all smug and smiling under those big square glasses, that made Gladio feel half a foot small. 

Worst of all, he even had _Noct_ on his side. That was the last straw for Gladio. He’d shown up with some marbles painted all over with flowers, thinking that Noct might find them funny, and Ignis had taken one look at them and said, in that weird, snooty voice of his, that _Noctis might choke on one of those!_ And Noct, Noct had looked at Gladio like he _meant_ it, and Gladio had to run off into the storerooms where no one could hear him cry. 

So when Ignis had come up to him on the dock of Galdin one day, grinning nervously with a box of fried dough in his outstretched hands, Gladio had knocked the box into the sea. 

At which point Ignis, eyes filling with tears, grabbed Gladio by the collar and pushed him in after it. 

 

\---

 

Noct was pretty sure he needed to go to Sania and have his head looked at. Had he been knocked out during the fight, maybe? The sound of the cannons could’ve rattled him, or the heat of being out in the sun most of the morning. Or maybe it was the sight of the ship sinking, men falling over the edge. The face of the galley captain as he ordered his men to toss the prisoners overboard. The blood on the doctor’s arms.

A hand splayed out over his chest, fingers twitching as it trailed down his abdomen. 

“You okay, buddy?” 

Noct looked down at the man kneeling at his feet, his kiss-swollen lips twisting in a worried frown. 

“Yeah,” he said. He tried to push the memory of the bodies in the water out of his mind. “Yeah, I’m good. I’m great.”

The man smiled, and Noct felt light-headed and warm, the same way he felt when he was out above the sails at night. From the deck, the ocean looked unchanging and vast, but the higher Noct climbed, the more he could see the subtle shifts of color and depth that marked shoals and currents, the joining of warm and cool water, the birth of storms. It never occurred to him that he could feel the same way just by looking at a pale, freckled face with dark lashes and a mess of blonde hair, a quirk of the lips he’d never seen before that evening. 

“Prompto,” he said, tasting the name on his tongue. “Can you—“

Prompto winked, which should have been ridiculous, except Noct was blushing, _blushing,_ like he wasn’t a full grown man of nineteen with a future laid out before him. Then Prompto’s mouth closed over the head of his cock, and Noct lost the ability to think in full sentences for a while. 

Prompto had found him an hour ago, sitting by the grain storerooms with one of the ship cats on his lap. It was one of Noct’s go-to places to hide aside from the main mast, and he half expected to see Gladio when he heard footsteps approaching on the thick wood floor. But the footsteps were softer, and the man who found him was the blonde who had held his hand on the boat as the war ship sank. 

He could never get used to death. He’d dealt his fair share of it, but that was usually with people who were trying to kill _him_ at the same time, and that probably didn’t count. But this, the deaths of people in chains, of children… Sometimes, he wondered if he was cut out to be a commander. He didn’t know what would happen to him—Would his heart keep breaking apart every time, leaving him one of the shattered, lonely old men who sat in the bars and talked about the legends they could’ve been? Or would he go hard, and forget what it felt like to hurt? He was about to find Gladio himself when Prompto had arrived, smile turned up at the corners, and introduced himself to the cat. 

“Oh, who’s beautiful?” he asked, rubbing the cat under her chin. “Are you? Yes, yes you are. What’s your name?”

“Brie,” Noct said, and Prompto looked up at him at last, nose scrunched in silent laughter.

“So what’s yours?”

And here they were, Noct stifling a groan as Prompto swallowed him down, fucking into his own fist almost frantically. Prompto wouldn’t look away, hadn’t looked away from the start, when they were just talking about cats and what it was like to grow up on the Crystal, how Prompto wanted to be a photographer one day, whether Noct had any dreams of his own. Noct thought he might break after all, thought the light that filled him now was probably pouring out of the cracks in his skin and making the whole ship radiate like a handful of sun, like—

“Ifrit’s balls.”

Noct got one, panicky look at the entrance to the storeroom before he came, hunching over Prompto with his hands in his short hair. Gladio had turned away, hand to his eyes, and even the horror of being seen wasn’t enough to stop Noct from trembling with the aftershocks of release, thrown by Prompto’s moan as his throat worked and his hand fell slack at his side. Prompto fell back, and Noct gestured to Gladio. Prompto turned. 

“Oh,” Prompto said. He waved a hand that Gladio couldn’t see. “Hey, there!”

“Please put your clothes on,” Gladio said. 

“Bossy, bossy.” Noct rolled his eyes at Prompto, who snorted, and the two of them fumbled for their clothes. 

“I’d ask what the hell you’re thinking,” Gladio said, as Noct buttoned Prompto’s pants up for him, “but that implies you were thinking at _all.”_

Prompto made a show of straightening Noct’s collar. Noct tried not to giggle, but it fell out anyway, and Gladio looked back with the long-suffering air of someone who would never, in all his life, be paid enough for this. 

“You done?”

“I’ll see you at noon,” Noct whispered, and Prompto’s easy smile broadened. “Maybe I’ll teach you how to climb the rigging.”

“And maybe I’ll teach you something _else,_ ” Prompto said, and laughed at Noct’s slack-jawed expression. “See ya, Noct! Later, big guy.” He pattered off down the path towards where the former prisoners were staying, leaving Noct to face Gladio’s impending wrath.

“Okay,” Noct said. “I can… I don’t think I can explain.”

“Yeah, thought so.” Gladio jerked his head. “Come on up. There’s something I need to tell you about the doctor.”

Now that Noct wasn’t in the middle of getting the best blow job he’d experienced in his known life, he could tell that Gladio looked more tightly wound than he had when the trap had fallen back at the galley. His jaw was clenched the same way Clarus’ was when he was about to snap, and he kept running his hand through his long hair. His shirt had been abandoned again, showing off his massive hawk tattoo that ran up his back and along his arms, but it just meant that Noct could see the tension bunching in his muscles as he walked. 

“So the doctor,” Gladio said, as they climbed up one of the ladders to the decks. “His name’s Ignis.”

“Who names their kid Ignis?” Noct asked. Gladio looked at him. “What?”

“Ignis Scientia. Ring a bell, Noct?”

Memory dawned, foggy and disjointed. “Wait. Wait, no. Are you talking about the doctors’ kid? The one who made you cry all the time?”

“Not relevant, Noct,” Gladio said, and the back of his neck flushed red. “Anyways, that was _him._ Your dad has him in his quarters right now.”

Noct whistled low and shoved his hands in his pockets. “The hell was he doing in chains?”

“That’s what I want to know,” Gladio said. “I don’t remember much, but you know how his parents took off once Tenebrae was taken over?”

Noct shrugged. “Gods, Gladio, I was like, six.”

“I remember,” Gladio said. He rolled his shoulders and looked to the dim light of the commander’s quarters. “He said he was a doctor on the warfront, Noct. Whatever happened after he left… Whatever got him _here…_ ”

“Hey.” Noct hadn’t seen Gladio look this upset in _years._ He bumped his shoulder, leaning against him as they paced the deck. “Don’t sweat it, Gladio. He’s here now, right?”

“Yeah,” Gladio said, in a low voice. “Alone.”

 

\---

 

Ignis stood behind the door of the commander’s private washroom, holding up a cotton dress shirt and grey slacks to the light of the moon.

“I hope you don’t mind hand-me-downs,” Regis said, from the other room. “But Noctis isn’t quite your height, and Gladio can be rather broad around the shoulders. I believe I may have been your size when I was around your age. The shoes will have to wait, of course. You’re all being fitted for them tomorrow.”

Ignis fought between old habits of well-bred dignity and the sudden desire to wear clothes that had been washed in the last three weeks. He stripped down so quickly he nearly tripped over his own feet. 

“Do you want us to see if we can recover your shirt?” Regis called.

“Gods, no,” Ignis said. “I mean, no, sir. Blood never comes out entirely.”

“An unfortunate truth.”

When Ignis opened the door again, having quickly scrubbed as discreetly as possible in the washbasin and tucked his shirt-tails in his slacks, he found himself caught up in a tight, bone-crushing embrace. The man lifting him off the ground was _not_ the commander, but there was something familiar in his face when he set Ignis down, a certain quirk to the eyebrow.

“Mr. Amicitia,” Ignis said. “Of course, I saw you earlier.”

“And you didn’t recognize me?” Clarus—yes, that was his name, Clarus—ruffled Ignis’ hair so hard he felt his scalp move. “But I didn’t see you, either. Regis was right. You _do_ look the spitting image of your father. Stand up straight, man, let us get a look at you.”

Ignis smiled helplessly. For all that he’d been yearning to see Regis and Clarus again, to tell Gladio and Noctis who he was, he hadn’t expected anything like this reception. He straightened his shoulders, and Clarus smacked Regis’ back. Regis gave Clarus a chilly look.

“He could be standing right there,” Clarus said. “And look, Ilia’s chin. And her smile? Yes?” He leaned down, and Ignis couldn’t help it—He laughed, short and startled, and both Clarus and Regis’ expressions grew soft and just a little mournful. 

“Just like,” Regis said. “And you’re a doctor, now.”

“Not officially,” Ignis admitted. Regis gestured for him to sit at a makeshift table, and he complied while Clarus went about gathering up what looked like an abandoned afternoon tea. “I never had a formal education. I suppose you can call it an apprenticeship—My parents taught me what I know on the field, during the war.”

“And where _are_ Ilia and Corrin?” Regis asked. He spoke slowly, and Ignis saw by the look in his eyes that he suspected the answer. “Were they captured as well? We would have seen them among the rescued, surely.”

“They’re dead,” Ignis said. The edges of Clarus’ mouth went hard. “In the raid that took me.”

“It takes a true monster to kill a doctor,” Clarus said. Regis placed a hand on his, and he fell into the seat next to the commander’s. 

“Sorry will never be enough,” Regis said. “But we are, Ignis. Truly. Your mother and father were… They have always been counted among our dearest friends. It worried us when their letters stopped coming.”

“We’ve been checking the prisoner escorts as often as possible,” Clarus said. 

Ignis found it suddenly hard to breathe. Was that why they’d targeted the galley that evening? For over a decade, Ignis had seen his early life on the Crystal as a faraway dream, as something unreal and unreachable. Yet these men had been here, scouting the coast on the off-chance of finding their old friends again.

“I’m sorry to bear such unfortunate news, sir,” Ignis said. Regis and Clarus exchanged another look.

“How old are you now?” Regis asked. 

Ignis caught himself fidgeting with his sleeve, and folded his hands in his lap. “I don’t know, sir,” he said, honestly. “What’s the date? I… I know a winter passed, at least.”

Regis, thankfully, didn’t ask him to elaborate. He simply pulled out his calendar and passed it to Ignis.

“Nearly twenty-one, then,” he said, examining the marked date. He tried to think back on the past two years. He was nineteen when he’d been captured. Then there was the march to the prison, which had certainly _felt_ like ages, and then waiting, waiting. Some kept count, but Ignis had been too busy riding out waves of grief, trying to build up an impassive face every time the guards thought to pass the cells. Then judgment, the branding, more waiting while Imperial officials decided where he would go to die. 

“Ignis.” Regis’ voice pulled Ignis out of the slow terror of his recent life, and he looked up again. “We will be setting up the prisoners through a trusted group of people in Galdin Quay, who will help them find new lives in Leide. But… if we may be so bold… We would like you to stay.”

“You don’t have to work as a physician,” Clarus said. “Though gods know we could use one who doesn’t collect frogs every time we go to port.”

“You can stay on in one of the officer’s cabins,” said Regis. “As a friend of the family.”

“ _As_ family,” Clarus amended. 

Ignis took a breath. Held it. Let it out slowly. “I enjoy the work,” he said. “If you’ll have me…”

“Of course,” Regis said. "It isn't in question."

That did it. Ignis felt his control slipping, but no amount of steady breathing could hold under that kind voice, and the concern in Regis and Clarus’ eyes. He lifted his hands to his face before they could see it fall, and when the first gasp left him, Clarus rose from his chair. Ignis was almost of a height with him, but Clarus’ arms were still as wide as he remembered, his voice the same, and the warmth of his embrace dragged out a cry from Ignis’ throat that was more of a wail than the sigh Ignis had expected. 

Standing on the ship that carried the echoes of his former life, Ignis sank into the arms of Clarus Amicitia, and let go.


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A short reprieve!

The threat of morning was creeping over the horizon as Ignis left the commander’s quarters, using the steps to the deck beneath what he believed was… the mast sail? The sail mast? He placed his hands on his hips, leaning back to take in the impossible height of the mast above him. Men and women were climbing down the rigging, nimble and fearless, and the grey sky turned them into shadows moving along a field of dying stars. 

“Don’t you clean up pretty.” A young woman with a shock of sun-bleached hair climbed up from the ladder leading to the rooms below. She gave Ignis a guileless, open smile, and jerked her head to the side. “Looks like the chosen men didn’t want to sleep in their hammocks tonight.”

He turned and nearly laughed for the second time in as many days. Gladio and Noct had positioned themselves just outside the commander’s quarters, and were slumped over one another in an unruly heap. Surely they hadn’t been waiting for _him?_ But Gladio would have remembered Ignis at least by name, if not by the unfortunate incident where Gladio nearly drowned because of a dispute over a pastry. 

That had _not_ been Ignis’ shining moment of civility. 

“Why chosen men?” Ignis asked. The woman smirked and thumbed her nose. 

“Noct’s a Caelum, so he’ll be given his own ship one day. Or he’ll take over this one when he can pry it from old Regis’ cold dead hands. And Gladio, everyone knows he’ll be his second. Watch this.” She waved to Ignis to follow her, and inched over to the two men. There, she spun and faced the incoming lines of sailors replacing those climbing down the rigging. 

“Look ahead!” she roared. Gladio and Noct jumped, heads knocking together as the woman’s voice rang out around her cupped hands. “Look a-stern! Look the weather in the lee!”

Gladio tried to stand, and accidentally used Noct’s shoulder as leverage. Noct hissed and grabbed at his arm, and they both went down. All along the ship, every sailor broke into a low, ominous cry, a chorus of so many voices that the very ocean seemed to quake with it. 

_Blow high! Blow low! And so sailed we!_

“Mornin,’ boys,” the woman said. “Sleep well?” She winked at Ignis and walked on, bellowing out the next lines. Ignis watched her, transfixed, trying to recall if the songs he’d heard as a child had ever been so overwhelming and strange. 

“I’m gonna _kill_ Cindy,” Noct said, and Ignis took pity on the tangled mess of humanity before him. He held out a hand to Noct, who grabbed it and tried to drag himself to his feet. 

“Oh, right,” Noct said, when he’d extricated himself from the corner at last. “Ignis. _The_ Ignis.”

“I expect so,” Ignis said. Noct rolled back on his heels, and looked over Ignis’ shoulder towards the window of his father’s quarters. 

“Long time, no see, I guess?”

“Nice one, Noct,” Gladio said, standing up with some difficulty. “Sorry about him. He’s not really housebroken. Raised by wolves.”

“Cats,” Noct said. “Anyways. Dad didn’t bother you, did he? Is everything okay?”

Ignis tried to find a satisfactory answer, and gave up. There was no way he could describe what had happened—hours of _talking,_ Clarus and Regis hovering over him like mother hens, telling him stories of his parents’ mishaps on the ship until the amusement nearly overtook the grief. Regis taking a hand in both of his. Calling him _son._

“They’ve offered me a position as one of the ship doctors,” he said. “I accepted.” 

“Hey, look at you,” Noct said, and elbowed Ignis in the side. Ignis wasn’t certain how to respond, but Gladio solved this for him by taking that moment to clap him on the shoulder. Ignis frowned at the long, agitated scar making a line along his cheek, and felt a pang of guilt. 

“And _as_ your doctor,” he said, “I will finally see to that cut before you die of infection. No excuses,” he added, as Gladio opened his mouth to protest. “I’m sure you’re familiar with gangrene, but have you ever seen a man’s _face_ rot before?”

“Yeah, that’s just what I need before breakfast,” Noct said. He hooked his thumbs in his belt loops and tripped down the steps to the lower deck, where he met up with a group of sailors who were gathering supplies to mend the sails. Gladio sighed and led Ignis down below, where they strode through storage rooms on their way to the infirmary. 

Sania was asleep in a fold-out bunk at the end of the room, so Ignis made Gladio sit outside while he rummaged through the cabinets for antiseptic. He found a whole row of bottles, and quietly blessed Sania for keeping a well-stocked medical supply. He gathered a few other small items—gauze, swabs, medical tape for the bandage—and returned to Gladio. He had to lean forward on his knees to clean out the cut, and Gladio’s legs parted slightly, giving him more room. 

Gladio hissed at the first touch of the antiseptic. 

“Baby,” Ignis said, with a smile. 

“That’s the Ignis I remember,” Gladio told him. “You never did apologize for the time you put jam in my hair.”

“I was four, and you deserved it,” said Ignis. “Don’t tense up. It’ll make it worse.” He cupped Gladio’s cheek with his free hand, running his thumb along the scruff of his jaw. Gladio closed his eyes. “And _you_ told everyone I was the one who stole the cook’s cherry pastries on the commander’s birthday.”

“I didn’t.”

“Gods’ truth.” Ignis finished cleaning the wound and sat back to give it time to air out. “I _do_ apologize for this, though. I should not have swung so carelessly.”

Gladio opened his eyes. “It’s fine,” he said. “You were tense. Was that your first time?” When Ignis didn’t respond, he said, “Killing someone.”

“Doctors aren’t meant to kill.” Ignis thought of the captain thrashing on the table, and scowled. “It shouldn’t matter if someone is an enemy, or a man who would throw chained prisoners overboard. My parents, they would have—” 

“Hey.” Gladio raised a hand to Ignis’, which was still holding his cheek. “Don’t do that. If it helps, I would’ve killed him anyway.”

“It doesn’t,” Ignis said. “But thank you.”

 

\---

 

The noon hour came with a cool spring wind in the sails, but Noct had a feeling that he wasn’t going to be teaching Prompto how to climb the rigging any time soon. He could see Prompto squinting into the light off the water, dressed in one of the spare tunics and trousers from the supply rooms, but he _also_ saw the covered awning being set up on the deck behind him. Cor Leonis was walking along the side of the deck, placing guns on the rail for drills, and Gladio was talking to Cindy behind the awning, holding two swords under his arm. 

Noct considered signaling Prompto and hiding out in the lower decks, when he saw Prompto wander over to one of the guns in the line, crouching down to examine their smooth barrels.

“Oh, hell,” he said. Cor had spotted the blonde, and was descending on him like a stormcloud, shoulders squared. Noct scurried down the ropes faster than he’d like, burning the palm of his left hand, and landed just in time to see Prompto point excitedly to the guns, then make a complicated gesture over his shoulder. Cor stopped and watched him, probably taking pity on a sun-sick kid making pantomimes, and after a minute of this, crouched down and thrust a musket into Prompto’s hands. 

“Shit,” Noct whispered. “Shit, shit.” He stumbled down the steps to the lower decks, past where sailors were going over the lifeboats. Prompto, still talking to Cor like being handed a gun was hardly out of the ordinary, primed, loaded, and aimed the musket over the open water. He fired, and all hands turned to watch as he gestured through the smoke to trace the trajectory of the ball.

Noct panted to a halt just as Prompto, talking a little louder after the blast of the gunshot, ran a finger in the air just above the muzzle of the gun.

“If it’s rifled,” he was saying, “you can go from, um, that, to maybe two-hundred yards. And the ball’s not round, right? Which means you don’t have to take so long to reload like you do with an ordinary rifle. That’s why the Nifs can always get a shot in before you’re close enough to fire.”

“Prompto! Hey!” Noct plastered on a false, terrified smile, trying to insinuate himself between Cor and the enthusiastic, unknowing Prompto. “We should get lunch. Don’t you think? Hi, Cor, sorry for interrupting, I know you’re setting up drills—“

Cor placed a hand on Noct’s shoulder and pushed him gently aside. “Hey, wait!”

“How do you know so much about this?” Cor asked, keeping a hand on Noct to hold him back. Prompto looked from Noct to Cor, suddenly wary, and held out his right hand. Over the wrist was a tattooed bar, with a chain of numbers and letters along either side.

“Defected?” Cor said. Noct, who’d assumed that the tattoo was just some kind of brand, caught Prompto’s gaze. He looked away quickly.

“Can’t defect if you don’t join up,” Prompto said. “Press-ganged. Dad worked in munitions. I knew a bit, so they put me in the MT division.”

Cor looked like he’d just been given an endless supply of ammunition and a paid month’s leave. “Prompto, was it?” he asked. He let go of Noct and slung an arm around the blonde’s shoulder. “Noctis, tell Monica to take over the drills. Prompto and I are going to take a walk to the gun decks.”

He strode off, towing Prompto along with him, leaving Noct alone on the deck in a state of abject despair.

“Tragedy,” Gladio said, from over Noct’s shoulder. “Two lovers, torn apart by destiny—The fuck, Noctis!” He cackled as Noct turned, shoving both hands in his face. Sabers clattered to the deck as Noct latched onto Gladio’s chest, throwing the both of them to the ground. They rolled, cursing fluently, while the men and women on the deck around them applauded. 

“Chosen men, are they?” asked the new ship doctor, sitting under the awning next to Cindy. Cindy laughed as Noct, caught in a headlock, yanked down on Gladio’s hair. 

“That’s them,” she said. “Our boys are somethin’ else.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Fun Maritime Fact! 
> 
> The Coasts of High Barbary is a fairly popular sea shanty! You can hear a fancy version of it [here](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P30WjkNMruk)  
> Shanties were usually sung in time with the work that needed to be done on the ship: Many of the more popular ones were sung when working the pumps, which definitely needed a rhythm to do well. There are also a ton of variations to any shanty, because sailors would change or make up their own lines. 
> 
> Listening to them sung live, over the water (which really does carry sound well) can be an experience.


	6. Chapter 6

A favorable wind saw the Crystal past the border of Tenebrae and along the trade route to Galdin. They passed merchant ships from Altissia once or twice, running up signal flags to exchange news: _Storm on the cape. Pirates at the cove. Sickness in the port of Duscae._ Gladio saw Prompto, Noct’s current obsession, running about in the gun decks behind Cor most afternoons, shouting excitedly over the bang and clatter of weapons maintenance. He could also be found with Noct in the evenings, now that Noct was back on the night watch, climbing up the rigging like he was born to it. He’d been effortlessly accepted into their ranks just as Ignis had, and it turned out that whatever he’d gotten up to during his time with the Imperial navy, he was happy just to be away. Preferably in Noct’s arms, but Gladio wasn’t about to judge.

Not when he kept trailing _Ignis_ around every free minute of the day.

He kept finding reasons to sneak off to the infirmary, usually to ply Ignis with food and the suggestion of stepping out into the open air once in a while. Like most of the former prisoners, Ignis had the sallow, shadowy-eyed look of malnourishment, and had a nasty habit of ignoring his own needs in order to look after those of the crew. Gladio nearly had to drag him onto the deck when there were games or contests being played, and it took convincing to encourage him to wander the ship during drills.

Most evenings, Ignis deigned to stay in Gladio and Noct’s hideaway, or in his sleeping quarters next to the infirmary. The commander had him, Gladio, and Noct over for dinner now and then, often with Clarus and Cor. At those times, Gladio spotted Ignis eyeing the books along the walls with open yearning.

So one evening, Gladio tore through his own collection and brought a thick, leather-bound book down to the infirmary.

“I thought you might like to borrow it,” he said, when Ignis stared at the book in his hand. He held it up for him. “It’s Yuna’s Treatise on the Inconsequence of Prophecies. Banned in three countries.”

Ignis’ fingers slid over the cover reverently, as though he were Sania encountering a long-extinct creature in the wild. “I haven’t read a book in two years.” He said it softly, almost to himself, and Gladio felt like he’d intruded on something private and far too personal. “But I can’t. Without glasses, I’d have to put my nose to the page. It’s a kind thought, however.” He pushed the book back into Gladio’s hold.

“You’ll have to buy some new glasses when we get to Galdin, then,” Gladio said. He sat back against the wall. “In the meantime, I can read _for_ you. If you don’t mind listening to my voice for that long.”

Ignis smiled, looking less like the haggard, ageless being he could sometimes become, and more like the young man he was. Gladio felt warmth ease into his bones at the thought, and took that as a cue to begin.

They made it twenty minutes before they started arguing over the first section of the Treatise. Ignis was of the belief that some fates were inevitable, and that the cyclical nature of history was proof that only the destruction of the old world could ever bring about positive change. Gladio pointed out that he was being a pessimistic mood-killer, which Ignis said was proof that Gladio couldn’t come up with a valid rebuttal. They ended up flipping through the book together, Ignis leaning over Gladio’s shoulder while Gladio read section markers aloud, trying to find the subject that would bolster one or another of their arguments.

“There you go,” Ignis said, finally. “The whole system has to be shucked. But even then, there’s no guarantee that humanity won’t make the same mistakes again.”

“Give us a little credit,” Gladio said.

Ignis snorted. “Try out that optimism in an Imperial prison and see where it gets you.”

An uncomfortable silence fell. Ignis coughed. “My apologies.”

“Don’t worry about it.” Gladio placed a hand on Ignis’, and felt fingers twitch under his palm. “If you don’t want to explain, you don’t have to. You remember old Lieutenant Drautos? Captains the Glaive now?”

“Was he the man from Galahd? With the…” Ignis waved his free hand. “He did that thing with the coin over his knuckles?”

“That’s the one. He spent _years_ as a prisoner of Niflheim when a raid went bad, right after you left. Escaped on his own. You can see the scars on his wrists from when they left the shackles on too tight.”

“He escaped?” Ignis’ eyes narrowed. “How?”

“Something about the prison being attacked,” Gladio said. “You can ask him when we meet up in Galdin, if you want. But what I mean is… No one’s gonna think differently of you, whether you want to talk about it or not.”

He squeezed his hand. “ _I_ wouldn’t.”

Ignis sighed and turned to him, pulling his hand away. He placed it on Gladio’s thigh instead, bunching up the rough cloth of his trousers. “I know.”

Then, as Gladio tried to figure out the soft, distant look in his eyes, Ignis leaned forward and kissed him.

It was a gentle kiss, hesitant at first, but when Gladio smiled into it and carded his fingers through Ignis’ hair, he was pushed down to the floor by a firm hand. Ignis climbed over him, and Gladio tugged him down for a second kiss, hungrier this time. He felt the tremor of a moan on Ignis’ tongue, the warmth of a blush at his neck, and he looked up into eyes blown wide and black.

“Damn, Ignis,” Gladio managed to say, and Ignis sank down to kiss his neck, trailing teeth over the skin just enough to make Gladio gasp. They moved together, seeking out a way in which their bodies could fit, legs shifting and rising, Ignis’ straight shoulders blocking out the light. Gladio kissed the underside of his jaw, and started undoing the buttons of his shirt. It slipped off his shoulders, and when Ignis bent down to claim Gladio’s mouth again, the wide circle of a brand lay dark on his right arm. It was a dragon, the crest of Niflheim, and Gladio couldn’t stop his breath from hitching at the sight of it. Ignis followed his gaze.

Ignis’ body froze, every joint and muscle locking up as he regarded the brand on his own arm.

“It’s fine,” Gladio said. Ignis shrugged his shirt back up, cream linen covering the mark, and slowly withdrew. “Ignis, please.”

“It’s late,” Ignis said. He hastily buttoned up his shirtfront with shaking fingers. Gladio sat up, reaching for him, but Ignis was already rising to his feet. “Perhaps… another time. I apologize.” He paused, lips parted, and _damn_ if he wasn’t beautiful. Gladio couldn’t believe he hadn’t noticed it before. He opened his mouth to tell him.

“Thank you,” Ignis said, and he had that young, lost look in his eyes again. “That was very. That is…”

“Maybe next time?” Gladio asked, trying to hide the whine in his voice.

“Yes,” said Ignis, tugging at his collar. “Maybe.”

 

\---

 

“You sure this is okay?” Prompto asked, as Noct led them into the abandoned closet-space behind the commander’s quarters. Noct gave him a weary look, and he laughed. They had an hour before Noct had to be on watch, and after finding people in the storerooms, carpentry rooms, and even the barely-used mess next to the kitchens, Noct was starting to wonder if the entire ship was conspiring against him.

“No one has the keys to this place but me,” Noct said, setting his lantern on an empty shelf. “And Dad. And Clarus, and Cor, and Gladio.”

“So everyone who can have me strung up by my thumbs, you’re saying.” Prompto’s smile was tilted up at the corners again, his nostrils flaring. He shouldn’t have looked cute. He shouldn’t have made Noct feel like his heart was about to burst out of his chest. None of this should’ve been happening. If Noct didn’t get his hands on him soon, he thought he might _die._ He shut the door after them and pushed Prompto up against the far wall, hands sliding under his shirt.

“Did you hear that, love?”

Prompto and Noct both looked to the wall. The commander’s washroom was on the other side, but Noct knew that his father was in bed by now. So why did it sound like _Clarus_ was there? Who was _love_ supposed to be?

Noct’s father’s voice called out from some distance off, muffled and faint. Prompto opened his mouth, and Noct covered it with a hand.

“Ship settling, Clarus. Come back to bed.”

Noct gave Prompto a panicky look. Prompto shrugged. Noct released Prompto and leaned against the wall, pressing his face to the side. He couldn’t have heard that right. It must have been a mistake.

There was a creak of bedsprings, a soft _thunk,_ and low laughter. “Gods, Regis, you’re insatiable.”

“It’s been a wretched few weeks, old friend. Allow me my indulgences.”

Oh, no. Oh, _no._ Noct felt Prompto take him by the shoulder, trying to pull him away from the wall. That was probably for the best. As it was, Noct didn’t think he could look either his father or Mr. Amicitia in the face again.

“The Empire knew,” Regis said, and Noct raised a hand. Prompto stopped tugging and shifted closer. “They saw us coming.”

“Who else knew our plans?” Another creak, a sigh.

“Gladio and Noctis. Cor. Nyx. Drautos.”

Clarus’ voice was so low that Noct could barely hear him. “I can’t see any of them betraying our movements. Someone must have overheard.”

“On a ship this size? And the Glaive? Inevitable. Gods, this will be a mess to unravel.”

“We’ll root them out,” Clarus said. “At least we found Corrin and Ilia’s boy.”

“Too late,” said Regis. “Poor man. Smiles like he’s asking for permission. If we’d moved sooner…”

“Here, now. You can’t save the _whole_ world. My love. My king.”

_“Clarus.”_

This time, when Prompto pulled Noct away from the wall, Noct did not resist. Prompto grabbed the lantern, and they fled quietly through the narrow back passage between the officers’ quarters, not saying a word until they’d shimmied down into a blessedly empty linen closet. There, Noct fell against the wall and slid to the floor.

“So.” Prompto sucked at his teeth. “ _Your_ dad and Gladio’s dad, huh?”

“We were betrayed,” Noct whispered.

“What?”

“Back there, at the galley. The trap by the Empire.” Noct ran both hands through his hair, tugging at the roots. “They knew we were coming because someone _told_ them.”

“Hey, hold on.” Prompto crouched down on his heels. “It’s not like it was one of the guys your dad was talking about. It was probably someone listening in. Like we did. There were spies all over the place in the Navy, too.”

“Yeah,” Noct said, bitterly. “Because it’s _Niflheim._ Sorry,” he said, after a moment’s silence. “I know you’re from there. I just…”

Prompto sat down gingerly. “Never said I liked it.” He held up his hand, showing off the mark. “Defected, remember?”

Noct stared at his knees. He’d grown up on this ship. He knew most of the crew from the Glaive, and he’d been with his father every time they picked up new sailors. None of them would betray the Crystal. The ship hadn’t seen a mutiny since it was first built, back in Noct’s grandfather’s time. No one would _dare._

“Noct?” Prompto nudged him with a foot. “Gladio’s dad. What did he mean by _king?”_

“We’re Caelums,” Noct said, simply, still mired in disbelief. He peered up into curious eyes. “Wait, you don’t know?”

“Wouldn’t ask otherwise, buddy.” Prompto scooted next to him, knocking their knees together.

“I guess the Empire doesn’t care,” Noct said bitterly. “But technically, we’re royal.” Prompto looked at him dubiously. “Sort of.”

The Lucis Caelums hadn’t worn a crown in over one hundred years, not since their capital city was burned to the ground, their army overtaken, and their royal family sent into hiding with the Amicitias. Clarus’ grandfather had been a child when it happened, and spoke of purple flame, demons from the sky, and the Empire. Clarus found the stories fanciful, but Regis took them seriously. The weight of his lineage was heavy on the last of the Caelums, and Regis’ feud with the Empire was in danger of consuming him. Just as it had consumed his father, and his grandmother before that. Just as it would one day take Noctis.

“My great grandmother was the last Queen of Lucis,” Noct said. “So that makes Dad king. King of nothing. Of a _ship._ And if he’s right, if we’ve been betrayed?” He looked to Prompto, unable to keep the fear from his voice. “We might not even have _that_ for long.”


	7. Chapter 7

Gladio stamped his feet on one of the largest docks of Galdin Quay, breathing in the scent of orange blossoms, wood polish, and tar. The orange groves that bordered the Quay were in full bloom, building up like a spray of foam along the rounded coquina walls. Most of the buildings in town were made up of the hard-packed shells pressed hard as stone, strong enough to withstand cannon-fire. Not that they needed to worry—The Quay was one of the few places in Eos that could reliably claim safety from pirate raids. This was, for the most part, because Galdin had thought to invite the pirates in.

“It’s rather crowded now, isn’t it?” said Ignis, stepping down the boarding plank behind him. He was in another one of Regis’ old cast-offs, with sleeves he’d rolled up to the elbow and shoes that barely fit him. His hair flew back from his face, sticking up slightly, and he raised an eyebrow at Gladio’s amused smirk.

“Beds!” Noct shouted, his voice carrying over the cry of gulls and the thud of wood against the dock. He ran down the plank, Prompto trotting after him, and swung himself onto Gladio’s arm. “Real baths!”

“You’re easily pleased,” Ignis said. Noct dragged at Gladio’s arm, and his sea bag went smacking into his side.

“Alright, we’re done,” Gladio said. He lifted his arm to shake Noct off, and Prompto grabbed Noct round the middle, pushing him a few feet down the dock. “Dad and the commander are checking everyone off, so you and me, prince charmless, need to prepare the house.”

“We have people for that,” Noct said, hooking his arm in Prompto’s.

“Really?” Prompto asked.

“Yeah. They’re us,” said Gladio. Noct groaned, and Ignis, at Gladio’s side, shook his head. “Doesn’t mean we can’t take the long way, though.”

They passed the raised hotel and restaurant that lay over the water, nestled between two one-and two-masted ships and fishing docks. They nearly lost Noct to a man selling fishing tackle, and Ignis stopped to use his new wages to purchase a pair of soft black gloves. He fit them on with a small smile, and Gladio remembered, too late, how the Scientias had been partial to gloves themselves when they sailed with the Crystal.

“Almost respectable,” Ignis said, and Noct kicked Gladio in the shin.

“Tone it down, Gladio,” he whispered. Gladio looked from Noct to Prompto, who were still locked together, and Noct’s face flushed scarlet.

They wound through the side streets, which were thick with the smell of bread and sizzling meat. Noct bought them all skewers at what looked like a window to someone’s house, and Prompto had to be dragged from the open door to a chocolate shop with a giant taffy puller at the counter.

The Amicitia-Caelum homes were side-by-side and connected by a trellised tunnel of jasmine and honeysuckle, and bees hung about the high coquina walls. Jared, the Amicitia family butler and Talcott’s grandfather, hurried to meet them at the gate. Ignis hovered at the back with Prompto as Jared exclaimed over the state of Noct’s clothes and Gladio’s long hair, and smiled at Prompto blandly when Noct said they would be sharing a room. When he saw Ignis, he pursed his lips.

“Doctor?” he asked, warily.

“Yes and no,” said Ignis. He extended a hand. “Ignis Scientia.”

Jared took his hand in a firm grip. “Welcome home, Mr. Scientia,” he said, as though Ignis were only returning after a weekend away. “I have a room that would suit you perfectly, if you will give me a moment to prepare. And you’ll be wanting a bath, I expect?”

“You’re a godsend, Mr… Ah…”

“Hester.”

“Yes, I remember now. Allow me to assist you.”

Gladio watched Jared lead Ignis off, talking to him about the changes that had been made to the curtains and the guest rooms, and saw Noct pointing Prompto towards his own quarters.

“I’ll be with you in a minute,” he whispered, and they smiled, bumping foreheads. Gladio tried not to stare. He and Ignis hadn’t moved beyond their initial fumbling, poorly-timed kiss, even though Ignis did look like he wanted to, sometimes. Watching Noct and Prompto interact was becoming a small form of torture.

When Prompto ran off at last, bag over his shoulder, Noct leaned in to Gladio’s side.

“So,” he said. “We have a week to find them.”

Gladio frowned. Noct had pulled him aside a few weeks before to tell him news neither of them should have been privy to—That their movements had been reported to the enemy by one of their own. The likeliest suspects should have been those who were told of the Crystal’s latest assignment, but Gladio still couldn’t consider the possibility of Drautos, Cor, or Nyx betraying them. So Noct and Gladio had decided that before they disembarked on their next escort mission with the Glaive, they would try to seek out the traitor themselves.

“Prompto’s already been talking to Cor,” Noct said. “Prom’s from Niflheim, even if he defected. He said Cor hasn’t done anything suspicious so far. And we’ll get the chance to see Drautos and Nyx tomorrow, probably. Wish we had more time.”

“We’re on a tight schedule,” Gladio reminded him.

The Crystal would usually dock for at least a few weeks, giving the crew time to relax, make repairs to the ship, and replenish their supplies. In this case, they were all being paid bonuses for a short stay on land before they and the Glaive, their sister ship, went off on a mission to escort travelers from Tenebrae to Altissia.

That was the official story. The truth, which only Gladio, Noct, and a few select officers knew, was that they would be escorting rebels out of enemy lines. The crew’s bonus was as much hazard pay as an apology for their brief stop at Galdin.

Gladio headed up the stairs to his own room, which had a view overlooking the garden. He wondered what his sister, Iris, would think of it all. She was off at boarding school, when she wasn’t staying at their home in Galdin or trying to escape school to sneak aboard the Crystal. Clarus had caught her trying to stow away twice, now, which was a shame, because Iris had a good eye for people. He’d trust her judgment in a situation like this.

He sighed and went to the washroom to make himself halfway presentable.

Noct hammered on his door a few hours later, shouting something about Mother’s and Showing Ignis how to live a little. He opened the door with a scowl, buttoning up the collar of a white shirt that still needed airing, and stopped.

Ignis stood behind Noct, dressed in a new dress shirt of light blue, open a few inches down the neck and soft as silk. He looked like he’d managed to scrub off nearly a year’s worth of ground-in dirt, and his hair was slicked back out of his eyes. He smiled at Gladio, and Gladio’s fingers fumbled at his collar.

“You look nice,” he said, through the roaring chaos of his mind. Ignis’ smile widened.

“Okay, you two,” Noct said, the filthy hypocrite. He dragged Gladio out by the wrist. “We’re going to Mother’s. You’ll love it, Prom. It’s run by these three guys who won’t shut up about their mom’s cooking—Get a move on, Gladio!”

Gladio and Ignis trailed after the other two as they left the house, so close that Gladio could smell the scented oils Ignis had used in his bath. He wanted to close the distance, to run his hands through Ignis’ light brown hair, to savor the taste of him on his tongue.

Ignis placed a hand on Gladio’s back, right over his shoulder-blades. It was a momentary touch, brief and light, but Gladio could feel the heat of it long after Ignis’ hand had fallen away.

They found a table in the back of Mother’s, next to a high partition embossed with cranes. Noct and Prompto immediately proceeded to try and climb one another at the same time, turning into a tangle of hands and mouths with the occasional rational thought rising up for breath. How they found the time to look over the menu, Gladio couldn’t tell.

“I don’t know if I should be insulted,” Ignis mused. Gladio laughed, but his voice was cut short by the feel of a hand resting on his thigh. He looked up at Ignis, who was examining his menu with every indication of interest. Ignis’ thumb brushed Gladio’s inner thigh, and Gladio tried to remember how to breathe.

“Is that Cindy?” Ignis asked, and his hand traveled midway to Gladio’s knee. Trying to keep his breathing under control with only minor success, Gladio looked through the throng of people at Mother’s and spotted a familiar mop of pale yellow. 

Noct disengaged from Prompto with a horrendous wet sound. “Oh, yeah,” he said. “The Highwind’s here, isn’t it? Means Captain Aranea’s in town.” He pointed to a silvery-haired woman all in black leather and red scarves, who was holding Cindy’s waist and whispering in her ear. He sat up and waved his arm. “Hey! Aranea!”

“Noct, gods, no,” Gladio said. “The last time we had dinner with Aranea, she took all the money you ha—Oh, hey, Captain.” 

Aranea Highwind wasn’t exactly a tall woman, but she offset this by wearing the kind of heels that could probably pierce solid wood if she kicked hard enough. She had an arm around Cindy, who was nursing a beer, and fixed her eyes on Ignis like a bird of prey spotting a shadow in the water. 

“Hello, boys,” she said. “Mind if we join you?”

“How many people are we talkin’ about?” Gladio asked. Aranea’s habit of picking up lovers was notorious in the harbors and ports off the coast. She picked them out carefully, remembered all their names, birthdays, and family histories, and was, according to Cindy, a very _generous_ lover. She tried to recruit Gladio for all of two hours before she threw him back, and despite everything, Gladio still felt a little wounded that he hadn’t made the cut. 

“Just us,” Aranea said. “Biggs and Wedge are out.”

“What about Crowe?” Noct said. He and Prompto scooted over on their bench to give Aranea and Cindy room, and Aranea shrugged. 

“Not really possible right now.” Gladio was about to ask her to elaborate—Surely Crowe would be there, since the Glaive was waiting for the commander’s orders to set sail—until Aranea spotted Ignis, and he caught the telltale gleam in her eyes. 

Oh, hell.

“Who’s this?” Aranea asked. She leaned her elbows on the table, and extended a hand to Ignis. “You look new.”

“He’s the new doctor on the Crystal,” Cindy said. “Some kinda rebel from Tenebrae.”

Aranea raised an eyebrow, and spots of pink rose to Ignis’ cheeks. “Really? You saw fighting up near Johthein Bridge, five years back?”

Ignis smiled wryly, and Aranea matched him, grin for grin. “Oh, no,” he said. “I wasn’t a soldier. I was one of the poor souls trying to keep them _alive_.” He paused. “But yes, I was there.”

“My man Wedge fought there,” Aranea said. “Lost a thumb in the explosion at the east bank. Maybe you met.”

“I’m afraid I have a poor memory for faces,” Ignis said. Aranea shrugged, and leaned back, lids half lowered. 

“I’ll bet you’ll remember mine,” she said. 

“Let’s get drinks,” Gladio said. He looked at Ignis, who was still blushing faintly, and wondered if he ought to ask Cindy to relay a message to her lover to back the fuck off—Except he didn’t really have a claim to Ignis. Ignis was free to choose whoever he liked and if he didn’t prefer Gladio, well…

Ignis’ fingers slid down the curve of Gladio’s thigh, and Gladio looked from him to Aranea. Aranea was watching him, smirking, leaning into Cindy’s hold. Noct and Prompto were climbing each other again, though Prompto kept sneaking looks at them as though they were a show at the theater.

“My word. An Amicitia and a Caelum, lowering themselves to engage with the common folk.”

Gladio and Noct looked up at the same time. Aranea glanced up and away, suddenly bored and vaguely uncomfortable. The new stranger standing at their table was a tall, middle-aged man with wavy hair dyed violet, wearing a grey jacket embellished with white cloth roses. He was smiling, but that meant nothing: Even sharks could smile from the right angle. Prompto fell off Noct’s lap, and Ignis’ hand clenched on Gladio’s thigh.

“Ardyn,” Noct said. “Don’t remember inviting you over.”

“Oh, I simply wanted to inquire after your health, my boy,” Ardyn said. “It’s good to see the line of Caelum is flourishing. And in such good hands.” He glanced at Prompto, who flushed.

“Ardyn?” Ignis said. Ardyn turned his mirthless smile to him. “Ardyn _Izunia?”_

“Captain of the Scourge,” Ardyn said, nodding his head. “At your service. My, is that a Tenebraean accent I detect? You are far from home.”

“So are you,” Ignis said. His hand was trembling. “I know who you are. You’re the dog of Niflheim.”

Aranea’s breath hissed through her teeth.

The table went quiet. Ardyn’s hands curled into fists on the table, and he bent down to examine Ignis’ face.

“I’m afraid tales of my exploits have been rather exaggerated in Tenebrae,” he said. “I am beholden to no country.”

“Every raid on the Tenebraean coast struck a rebel base,” Ignis said. He leaned forward as well, drawing himself level with Ardyn’s mocking grin. “Every one. Your men went straight for our medical supply lines in Marsel, and your weapons were made in the _Empire.”_

 _“Our_ supply lines?” Ardyn asked. “What company you keep, highness.” He winked at Noct, who was staring at Ignis in mixed outrage and dread. “Why, what we have here is a rare breed indeed. A _patriot.”_ He leaned further over the table, his soft smile offset by the furrow in his brow.

“It’s called conviction,” Ignis said. “Though I’d expect the word is foreign to you.”

“Easy, handsome,” Aranea said. 

“Ignis.” Noct’s voice was cold, with an echo of his father at his most aggrieved. “We’re done here. Ardyn, you’ve had your fun.”

“Hardly, my dear boy,” Ardyn said. Noct rose from his seat, and Ardyn took a step back. He gave Noct a low bow, sweeping his hat off his head and pressing it to his chest.

“As his highness commands,” Ardyn murmured. Noct’s hands twitched for the hilt of a sword he didn’t have, and Ardyn laughed, low and indulgent, turning to saunter towards the bar.

“Don’t fucking do that again,” Noct said to Ignis. “That was the Accursed. You don’t go around making an enemy of him.”

Ignis stared after Ardyn’s retreating back.

“Ignis?”

“Yes, I’m aware,” Ignis said. “That was foolish of me. I apologize.” He made to rise. “It would be best if I return to the house.”

“Stay,” Aranea said. “Ardyn’s just an asshole. He’s always trying to get under pretty-boy’s skin, here.” She nodded to Noct, who was too busy watching Ignis to notice. “Don’t let him get under yours.”

“Again, my sincerest apologies,” Ignis said. He held out a hand, and Aranea gamely placed hers over his palm. He kissed her knuckles, and Cindy snickered. “Your company was certainly diverting, Captain Aranea. We should meet again under better circumstances.”

“Oh, we will,” Aranea said. She winked at Gladio. 

“We should go,” Gladio said.

They made it to the house wrapped in a furious silence. Ignis’ anger was palpable, draped tightly around him like a cloak, and he hardly managed a perfunctory greeting to a startled Jared before pounding up the stairs. Prompto stood off to the side, tugging at his hair, while Noct turned to Gladio.

“He’s probably pissed at me,” he said. “Can you…?”

“I’ll try,” Gladio said. Noct gave him a grateful look, and Gladio headed up the stairs for Ignis’ room. He barely knocked before the door swung open.

“May as well come in,” Ignis said. His eyes were bright, and he looked like he’d been clenching his jaw tight enough to crack. Gladio stepped into the room, and sat down on a small couch next to a banked fireplace.

“Here we are, then,” he said, looking to Ignis. 

Ignis’ voice came out in a snarl. “To think,” he said, his bare feet pacing on the plush carpet, “that such a man is allowed to walk free. _Him!_ A… a murderer of children, a pawn of the Empire.”

He rolled up his sleeves, rumpling the cloth. “I know _he_ never saw the inside of a cell. The Empire makes deals with pirates. With criminals. But free people fighting for the right to their own government? Oh, gods forbid. Patriot, he calls me. Like an insult! Of course _he’d_ see it that way.”

Gladio crossed his legs, leaning back on the couch as Ignis walked to the dresser, saw his own, dark-eyed expression in the mirror, and whirled back around.

“And he speaks to you,” Ignis said, throwing his hands up. “As though he deserves to breathe the same _air!”_

“Ignis, I know.”

“That man has been walking free while _my_ princess lies in hiding, while _my_ countrymen die by the hundreds, while I—“

He turned, lowering his hands to his sides.

“I see men like Ardyn,” Ignis said, voice shaking, “and I wish I’d never thought to become a doctor.”

“It’s fine to be angry, Ignis,” Gladio said. Ignis sighed loudly and sat next to him, hands clenched in his lap. “You can’t just turn this shit off. It’s part of you.”

Ignis ran a hand over his eyes. “It shouldn’t be,” he said. He sat there for a minute, staring into the lamp that sat on his bedside table, and let out a long breath.

“I need to not think of this for a while,” he said. 

Gladio nodded. “I got you.” He stood, brushing off his knees, and placed a hand on Ignis’ shoulder before slipping away, heading for the door.

Ignis’ voice stopped him as he reached for the handle.

“I never asked you to leave.”


	8. Chapter 8

The bed in Ignis’ new room had two sets of curtains: Long, scratchy swathes of mosquito netting tied in bundles along the railing, and white curtains to reflect the heat of the morning sun. Both of them fell part-way as the bed shook, dark wood scraping against the smoothed-down stone of the wall. The netting landed over Gladio and hooked over Ignis’ legs, which were propped up on Gladio’s broad shoulders.

“It’s a sign,” Ignis said. He could barely recognize his own voice. “Come in, Gladio.”

Gladio sat up on his knees and held Ignis’ hips in his calloused hands, pushing him back on the bed. Ignis let out an embarrassing gasp, and Gladio, climbing onto the bed after him, smiled. He thumped the bedpost once, twice, until the rest of the curtains fell about them on every side, leaving the room beyond muted and faint.

Gladio was still sitting up, kneeling between Ignis’ parted legs. He undid his shirt with quick efficiency, revealing the inked feathers along his arms, the beak of a bird of prey over his heart. Ignis raised a hand to trace the head of the bird with his fingers, and felt Gladio shiver. Gladio dropped the shirt over the side of the bed and leaned down, bracing his arms on either side of Ignis’ chest.

“You can keep yours on,” he said. Ignis, who was running his hands over the wings on Gladio’s shoulders, had to take a moment to understand what he meant. He felt heat rise to his face.

“No,” he said. “No, it’s fine.” It would be. He just had to ignore it. If he kept his head tilted towards his left shoulder…

Gladio kissed down Ignis’ neck, and undid the top button of his shirt with a pull of his fingers. Every inch of Ignis’ exposed skin was met with the brush of Gladio’s lips, the sting of his teeth, the slow pressure of his hands. Ignis melted into it, digging his own hands in Gladio’s hair as the last button came undone.

Gladio slipped the right sleeve of Ignis’ shirt down past the brand, and Ignis couldn’t stop the tension that ran through him at the feeling of cool air on the mark. Then Gladio… Gladio’s breath was over it, his lips tracing the edges of the brand, warm and soft and too gentle. Ignis covered his eyes with his left arm, breathing slowly.

“Too much?” Gladio asked. His lips moved the skin below the brand as he spoke.

“Keep going,” Ignis said. Gladio tugged Ignis’ shirt down, and pulled his arm free. Ignis’ breath hitched when Gladio slipped off his gloves, and he smiled at the feel of Gladio’s lips on the back of his hand.

He probably should have let Gladio leave. A responsible man would have. A responsible man wouldn’t have pushed Gladio against the door loud enough to make it rattle, or slide a knee between his impossibly muscular thighs and chase down the expression that flicked across Gladio’s face at the feel of him.

Ignis supposed that somewhere, tucked away in the disaster of the last two years, he’d forgotten how to be responsible.

When Gladio started working on the top button of Ignis’ slacks, Ignis nearly moaned.

“Gladio, please.” His own hands flew to his waist, prying the buttons loose for him, and Gladio smirked and yanked the slacks down Ignis’ thighs. Ignis tried to refrain from scowling--His hips and legs were far too bony and angular to be attractive--but Gladio bit down on the sensitive skin of his inner thigh.

“You’re fucking gorgeous like this,” he said. Ignis made to object, truly, but then Gladio’s mouth was on the base of his cock, and the sound that broke free of Ignis’ throat was strangled and keening.

Gladio’s hands continued the exploration of Ignis’ body as Ignis was given fully over to pleasure, panting on the crisp white sheets of the bed. When Gladio’s fingers slipped under the small of Ignis’ back, urging Ignis on, Ignis bucked shallowly into Gladio’s mouth. His eyes snapped open, horrified, but Gladio was watching him, lips pillowing around Ignis’ cock as he sank further down. His fingers tightened over Ignis’ back, pulling him upwards, and Ignis thrust again. Gladio groaned around him, and Ignis reached back to place both hands on the top of the headboard.

“I’m close, Gladio,” he warned. “I don’t think I can…” He wailed when Gladio redoubled his efforts, bobbing his head quickly, taking Ignis down to the hilt and up again to press his tongue against the slit of Ignis’ cock. Ignis’ hips jerked, fucking into Gladio’s mouth, and everything was heat and touch and tight pressure until he felt his body snap like an over-coiled spring, and he came, shuddering, down Gladio’s throat.

Ignis’ hands slipped down from the headboard as Gladio lifted himself up on his elbows.

“I could get used to this look on you,” Gladio said, and Ignis let out a weak huff of disbelief. He beckoned, and Gladio climbed over him. Gladio was framed by the white curtains, hair mussed, smile wicked. Ignis tried for a little wickedness of his own, and dragged him down for a slow, lazy kiss.

“Now,” Ignis said, trailing his hands down Gladio’s sides. “Let’s see _you_ come undone.”

 

\---

 

Night had finally settled over Galdin in truth by the time Ignis and Gladio lay back, sticky with sweat and too hot to do more than drape a hand or a foot over each other’s bodies, against the side of the bed. Somehow—Ignis wasn’t entirely sure when—they’d found reason to take their efforts to the floor in an attempt to make it to the washroom connecting their bedrooms. So far, they’d made it three feet in the space of an hour.

When they heard knocking on a door down the hall, Gladio cursed.

“In Ignis’ room!” he shouted.

“Oh, I see.” That was Clarus, sounding nonplussed. “Helping Ignis settle in?”

Ignis and Gladio exchanged a long look.

“Yeah,” Gladio said, as Ignis shook with silent laughter. “Something like that.”

“Very good. You’ll be needed in Regis’ study. Ignis?”

“Yes...” Ignis cleared his throat. “Yes, sir?”

“You should come along as well. This may concern you.” Clarus’ footsteps disappeared down the hall, presumably on the way to Noct, and Gladio and Ignis winced and groaned as they got to their feet.

Ignis liked to think that they arrived at Regis’ study only looking mildly debauched. Noctis, on the other hand, limped in with the back end of his hair sticking up, his shirt a mess, and a purple bite mark at the base of his neck too garish to ignore. He kept behind Gladio, looking at Ignis sidelong.

“I apologize for earlier,” Ignis whispered, surreptitiously leaning over to tug the back of Noct’s shirt down to straighten it. “Though you might want to do something for your hair.”

Noct smiled brightly. “I dunno, I think Prompto did a pretty good job of it earlier.”

Ignis sighed and moved away, and Gladio stepped on Noct’s foot, earning himself a kick in response.

Regis, sitting at the desk with Clarus speaking over his shoulder, either had the best selective hearing known to man, or was too concerned with the notes on his desktop to care. He glanced up, and Noct and Gladio immediately stood a little straighter, legs apart. Ignis entertained the idea of following their lead, but, as he’d said often enough to the rebels who hung around his parents’ clinic, _he_ was no soldier.

“You may wish to take a seat, boys,” Regis said. Noct and Gladio fell at ease, and Ignis tried to fit the cadence of Regis’ voice in his mind. There were so many unspoken rules in the course of running a ship; It was like being in a shrine to an unknown god, standing and kneeling out of time, while watching the others out of the corner of his eye. Clarus motioned for Ignis to sit in a high-backed cedar chair, and Ignis looked from Clarus to Regis, trying to get a read on the situation. Clarus was better at hiding his emotions than the commander: His face was enviously smooth, whereas Regis was stiff with fury. Ignis wondered where Clarus had learned the skill.

“The Glaive has sailed,” Regis said. Noct and Gladio sat up. Noct’s face held no confusion, just grim resignation, and a shadow of fear flashed in Gladio’s eyes. “Nearly a month past. They were meant to wait for us to escort them, as you know, but Captain Drautos gave the order to disembark.”

“Betrayal, then,” Gladio said.

“Not _Drautos,_ ” said Noct. “Someone gave him false information. Or lied that we couldn’t make it.”

Clarus said nothing. Regis twisted a black signet ring on his right hand, the crystal at its center flickering in the light of his reading lamp.

“It may be as you say, Noctis,” he said, but he didn’t sound convinced. “However… The Glaive cannot fulfill this mission alone, and he is not so foolish to think otherwise. We must be prepared for the possibility that Drautos is no longer working with our interests, or the interests of Tenebrae, in mind.”

Ignis heard his own voice speak up as though from a long distance. “Sir?”

Regis looked away, and Clarus, sitting by Ignis’ left, put a hand on the arm of Ignis’ chair.

“You must not repeat this information beyond this room, son,” Clarus said. Ignis nodded. “The rebels we are meant to escort to Tenebrae are key leaders in the movement against Niflheim. One of whom is her highness, Princess Lunafreya Nox Fleuret.”

Ignis could tell that Clarus was still speaking, trying to explain the purpose of their mission, but the entirety of Ignis’ world had shrunk to a pinprick, surrounded by white noise. He looked at the warm light of the lamp on Regis’ desk, and felt the pulse of his heart thrumming through him, hard and fast.

Princess Lunafreya. The rebels spoke of her with reverence, like a god, like an oracle. With the betrayal of Prince Ravus to the Empire and young Lunafreya trapped in the castle at Tenebrae, those who remained in the resistance had thought their fight done, lost before they could truly begin. Then, at the battle of Versun, a fourteen-year-old Luna stepped out onto the field in the blue uniform of Tenebrae, wielding a trident as she stood at the front of a line of pikemen.

Niflheim learned to dread her appearance at the war-front. As soon as her white and blue flag was raised, her light blonde hair flowing back in the smoke of musket-fire and cannon blasts, the Niflheim army might as well surrender first and save themselves the trouble. She fought like a daemon, and her speeches were transcribed and pinned to doorways across the kingdom. Ignis’ parents had a small portrait of her nailed to the wall of their clinic, and some of the rebels who passed through would bow to it as though she were truly in the room.

Ignis had even met her, once.

He was fifteen years old, nerves on fire with the deafening sound of battle on the front outside, and had difficulty keeping his hands steady as he stitched up wounds and gave drops to those who would need help to pass on without pain. He hadn’t heard his parents stand when their tent flap was opened, and it wasn’t until two scarred, dirty hands crossed his, holding the leg of the soldier he was tending, that he knew they weren’t alone.

He’d looked up into blue eyes gleaming in a soot-streaked face.

“Tell me what I must do,” the princess had said.

“I’ll need alcohol,” Ignis said. “For his shoulder.”

They didn’t speak beyond short requests and questions, and Ignis slipped back into the quiet state he needed in order to do his work. Now and then, the princess would stop to hold a soldier’s face, or speak to them softly, whispering encouragement and praise.

“Of course I’ll stay with you,” he heard her say to a man who lay dying at the back of the tent. She gripped his slack hand in both of hers. “I won’t let go. What’s your name, hero? What’s your name…”

“Ignis.”

Ignis blinked away tears. He was in Regis Lucis Caelum’s family home, surrounded by maps and paintings of flowers, and the light before him was suddenly too strong, too bright.

“Niflheim…” Ignis ignored the look of concern on both Noct and Gladio’s faces. “They are known to make deals with criminals. They shorten their sentences in return for information, or loyalty.”

“They didn’t ask you,” Noct said. Ignis’ smile was thin.

“Oh, no,” Ignis said. “They did. They can always use names.” It hadn’t worked. He’d cursed them even as the brand in the fire grew cherry red with heat, even when they shoved the gag between his teeth to prevent him from biting through his own tongue. But there wasn’t anything he could give them, anyways. All the people who mattered were dead.

“So maybe Captain Drautos didn’t escape,” Gladio said. “Maybe he was freed.”

“You will tell no one.” Regis rose from his seat. “Inform them that we will see fighting, but naught else. We will set sail and follow the Captain’s projected path in five days.” When Ignis shifted, he shook his head. “We must be prepared for a fight, Ignis. It will do no one any good to rush in only to be killed at the start.”

“But her highness, sir.” Ignis stood despite Clarus’ hand reaching for his shoulder. “They’ll execute her, you know this.”

“It will take Drautos two months to make it to the harbor off the capital of Niflheim if this is the case,” Regis said. “And he will need to double back to avoid the Band of the archipelago. We can intercept him there.”

“He’ll be ready for us,” Clarus said. “And Prince Ravus...”

“High Commander Ravus,” Ignis said. He didn’t _deserve_ his old title.

“Yes,” Clarus said, giving Gladio a wary look. Gladio stood at Ignis’ side, and placed a hand below the back of his neck, warm and comforting. Ignis closed his eyes. “High Commander Ravus commands the Titan, Niflheim’s greatest man of war. It is likely that he will take an interest in his sister’s capture. We will need what loyal crew remain on the Glaive.”

“Gladiolus, Noctis,” Regis said. They straightened at his formal tone. “There is much work to be done. Ignis, you and Professor Sania must come to me no later than noon tomorrow with a list of needed supplies. I will provide the coin. Noctis, send that young man of yours to the inn and have him bring Cor and Monica to me at once.”

The three of them nodded and bowed, then filed out of the study. Ignis glanced back in time to see Clarus standing behind Regis, speaking softly into his ear and running a hand through the commander’s silvery hair. Regis looked _old,_ unguarded and heavy with exhaustion, and the cold weight of fear pressed on Ignis’ mind as the study door clicked shut.


	9. Chapter 9

“I swear, Ignis,” Sania said, as Ignis followed her out of the local medicinal supply store in a daze. “People in this town have no respect for the chaotic _beauty_ of science! Look at this!” She gestured to an iguana sitting in the middle of a bakery yard. “Hundreds of these little buddies out here, but are they native to Galdin? Are they?”

Ignis opened his mouth to respond.

“Of course they aren’t!” said Sania. “If you knew what they’ve done to the ecosystem here, you’d pull your hair out. But they sell pictures of them on little postcards to send home.”

Spending his days in the infirmary of the Crystal with Sania had certainly been an education, but Ignis found that on land, the wide-eyed doctor was so animated that holding a conversation with her was like trying to plug a dam with gauze. Sania’s brown cheeks glowed as she railed against the introduction of pesticides to the fields beyond the orange groves, extolled the virtue of wasps while Ignis tried to duck out of range of a nest of them, and managed to bully every supplier, doctor, and nurse in town into trading them most of their needed supplies for a pittance. Ignis was in awe.

“It’s all about _dedicating_ yourself to the scientific process,” she said, when they left a store that sold cheap linen out of their storage shed. Ignis’ arms were starting to ache, but if Sania tired, she didn’t show it. “I thought that Noctis boy would be interested, but sadly, it seems his heart is set on joining the theater.”

Ignis thought about this. “Are you… certain that’s what he said?” he asked.

“What?” Sania blinked at him. “Oh, I’m sure. Don’t know why he’s still on the ship, though. Collecting life experience, no doubt. Very important for thespians. Why? We aren’t about to lose _you_ to the stage, are we?”

Ignis could only shake his head. Sania smiled and carried on, making a beeline for the Crystal while Ignis staggered under his parcels behind her.

Prompto was on the deck of the ship, keeping watch, when Ignis emerged from the dark below. He was leaning over the railing, watching fishermen pass by beneath him with a somber look in his eye.

Ignis hadn’t really noticed Prompto on the galley. Then again, he had no reason to. Prompto was just another filthy set of arms on an oar, another closed-off face in a sea of faces. Even when Ignis did rudimentary check-ups on the prisoners during their stay on the Crystal, he knew Prompto mainly by way of his physical state: Old lacerations on his back, scars on his calves, an infected cut on his shoulder that had to be cleaned and bandaged. Later, when Prompto and Noctis became the worst-kept secret on the Crystal, he was nothing more than a young man with a toothy grin and a self-conscious laugh, leaning on Noctis’ arm. He revealed himself in pieces, and Ignis wasn’t quite sure what to make of him.

He sidled up next to him at the railing. “Are you staying with the Crystal, then?” he asked.

Prompto looked up. “Mm? Oh, yeah. Cor says I’m a crack shot with a rifle, and you actually get paid, here.”

“They don’t pay enlisted men in Niflheim?”

Prompto rolled his eyes. “Got three months of back pay they owe me. So I’ll stick with the Crystal. Besides…” He rubbed his wrist, where his tattoo was covered by a leather band. “Can’t really go home, yeah?”

Ignis looked away, towards the forest of masts that made up the harbor. Cats minced along the docks like queens, darting between the feet of dock workers and sailors, and laughter echoed out from the restaurant on the water. Fishing boats were coming in with the tide, and Ignis could see the impression of names carved along their weathered hulls. He allowed himself a moment to breathe it in, to ground himself, and pushed away from the railing.

“Hey.” Ignis stopped as Prompto reached out to touch his arm. “I’m. I’m glad we both made it. You seem like a good guy. Kind of intense.” His eyes crinkled in a smile. “But you’re okay.”

“I’ll try to live up to your estimation of me,” Ignis said. Prompto scoffed and batted him off, and Ignis headed down the boarding plank.

He had to pass the Scourge on his way to the optometrist, who set up shop just off the docks in an alley Sania had pointed out to him that morning. The Scourge was massive, painted in garish dark purple and black, and Ignis looked up at the masts with distaste: Ardyn had decided to paint his masts _white._ It was entirely impractical, but there they were, bright and blinding in the sunlight, making shadowy stripes along the deck.

“Beautiful, isn’t she?”

Ignis didn’t need to look to know _that_ snide, condescending tone. He made himself give the Scourge one more once-over, and raised his shoulders in a half-shrug.

“Rather gauche,” he said. He didn’t bother looking behind him, and made to walk on towards the end of the dock. Ardyn, wearing the same coat as last night despite the heat, insinuated himself at Ignis’ side. He walked with a saunter, hips swaying, hat threatening to blow off in the breeze. Ignis resisted a sudden urge to knock it into the water himself. Ardyn saw Ignis glance his way, and smiled warmly.

“To each their own, but she _is_ a dear old thing. How are you taking to Galdin, my young patriot?”

Ignis didn’t respond. He tucked his hands in his pockets, and mentally traced the quickest path back to the Caelum and Amicitia houses. There were guards there, at least. Ardyn clicked his tongue.

“Funny thing,” Ardyn said. “Did you know that there’s a bounty from the Empire for anyone known to be a member of the Tenebraean rebel forces?”

“Good to know,” Ignis said. He stopped, and turned on his heel. “But I, Captain, am a doctor. If you believe I--”

“Oh, no,” said Ardyn, raising a hand. “I wouldn’t dream of suspecting you. Physicians are _noble._ They’ll heal anyone who comes to them, rebel or no.”

Ignis made his face go carefully blank, which was a mistake. He should have responded with anger at the implication in Ardyn’s voice, but he couldn’t help but remember the captain in the galley. How easy it had been to make that first incision, how quickly he’d cast his parents’ lessons aside…

Ardyn’s smile grew cold. “Ah, I knew I had a good eye for people.” He clapped a hand on Ignis’ right shoulder and squeezed, just short of painful. “A word of advice, from one man of… unsteady principles… to another. You should steer clear of the Caelums.” His face twisted into a mask of sorrow. “Where a Lucis Caelum goes, misfortune is sure to follow. You could say it’s written in the stars.”

“I did not give you leave to _touch_ me,” Ignis said. He wrenched out of Ardyn’s grip and headed for the alleys at a quick pace, not daring to look back. Behind him, beyond the creak of rigging and the groan of wood expanding in the heat, he could hear the low, musical tones of Ardyn’s laughter following him home.

 

\---

 

When Ignis spoke of his encounter with Ardyn to Regis, the commander assured him that if Ardyn were to make an attempt on anyone in his crew, he would be breaking the peace accord that lay over Galdin. His ship would be rowed out to the edge of the harbor, abandoned, and burned in full view of its crew. Nevertheless, Regis decided that it might be best for Ignis to be assigned a guard.

Wasn’t it lucky, Clarus said, that Gladiolus was there to volunteer?

And so Gladio accompanied Ignis to obtain a new set of glasses, whereupon he dragged Ignis directly to the closest used bookstore and ordered him a small library’s worth of novels, medical textbooks, and a few dreadful ten-gil romances that Gladio assured him were “really pretty good, promise.” Ignis looked over the cover of one, which featured a bosomy woman ripping her gown in pieces at the shoulders, and declined comment.

Their preparations for departure took over the rest of their stay. Ignis helped Noctis and Prompto run an inventory of the storage rooms. Sania made three more runs for supplies. Gladio was always there, helping load and unload barrels and boxes, bickering with weary shopkeepers over the cost of grain, and telling Noct that no, they had plenty of cats on board already, and no, he didn’t care if he’d already named her.

They barely had the energy to wash up and crawl into bed at the end of the night, most days. Gladio would slip through their connecting washroom to climb under the sheets with Ignis, where they rolled about in the heat and kicked the sheets to the floor. Poor Gladio was hot as Ifrit’s furnace, and Ignis would only just begin kissing down his neck or running his hands up his chest before he would have to stand over the sink and dump a basin of water over his head.

“You’d think we’d get a breeze at _least_ ,” Gladio said, while he lay over Ignis and dripped warm water onto his forehead. Ignis only sighed, pushed his hair back, and kissed his brow before rolling away.

Every day they stayed in Galdin felt like another nail in Princess Lunafreya’s coffin. Ignis was up well before dawn when they were finally due to depart, already packed. He had a new wardrobe, two sets of surgical gloves and one pair for vanity, the books Gladio had bought for him, and a second pair of glasses that Noct and Prompto had secretly acquired the day before. He met Prompto at the foot of the stairs, and listened to the chaos that was Gladio trying to wake Noct before three a.m.

“You’re a _monster,_ ” Noct groaned, as he stumbled down the stairs. He shook water from his eyes, and Ignis saw that some of it had stained the front of Gladio’s shirt. “That vase had _flowers_ in it.”

“So do you,” Prompto said. He darted forward and plucked a wilting sylleblossom from under Noct’s collar. Noctis glowered at Gladio, who smiled sweetly and gently pushed him into place beside Prompto.

Regis and Clarus were already on board, so they said their goodbyes to Jared and Talcott, who had been urged to stay behind for this venture. Ignis noted that a number of the younger members of the crew had been offered the same courtesy, and some of them were staying at the Amicitia house for this particular outing. The rest of the crew had noticed, and rumors about the early departure of the Glaive had been hard to stamp out.

Ignis was pleased to find that the white-masted eyesore that was the Scourge was nowhere in sight as they made it to the docks. He set his belongings in the infirmary and followed Sania to the deck, where they watched the rest of the crew run about and prepare to cast off. It was a good few hours before they were ready, but soon, Gladio’s shout could be heard across the water, loud and echoing but not intelligible to Ignis’ untrained ears. There were other calls, Cindy’s distinctive cry among them, and the Crystal slowly cleared the dock. Ignis was surprised, at first, to find that they didn’t release the sails right away, but when they did, the sight of them unfurling blotted out the sky. The ship tacked until it found a steady wind, and Ignis could hear singing below the deck as the Crystal made it’s way towards the sea, the Glaive, and the woman who held the heart of Tenebrae.


	10. Chapter 10

“You’ll drive yourself mad that way.”

Ignis looked up from his new text on anatomy, which was being eclipsed by Gladio’s impressively large shadow, and adjusted his glasses. The man was smiling, but it didn’t seem to be in a particularly pleased way. Ignis gently shut his book on a strip of cloth to mark the page. 

“Reading only leads to madness in fiction, Gladiolus. I’m not about to start fighting windmills.”

Gladio dug his hands in his pockets. “You will if you stay down here all the time,” he said. “Come on up. Get some fresh air.”

Ignis couldn’t see the point. The closer they inched to the peninsula where the Glaive was estimated to be heading, the more Ignis’ dreams filled with the terror of dying faces, of wounds too wide and ragged to stitch shut, of leather gags and sawdust and the glint of a saw. Of her highness Lunafreya, still a young teen as Ignis remembered her, but grey and cold, sinking into the sea.

He’d been up on deck twice: Once when the crew was called in shifts to memorize a new set of signal flags for combat maneuvers, and again when Regis had ordered him out to walk the length of the ship, inquiring carefully about how Ignis was _getting on_ with Noct and Gladio. Noct himself had stopped by more times than Ignis could count, dropping off dirty comics and showing him one of his favorite ship cats, Aerith, who rode on his shoulders with her claws deep in his flesh for balance. 

Gladio crossed his arms. 

“I expect you’re prepared to stare me down until I give in, do you?” Ignis asked.

“I grew up with Noct,” Gladio said. “I got plenty of practice.”

Ignis groaned and set his book aside, and Gladio’s smile came out wide and true. 

“We’ve got weeks before we get there,” he told Ignis, as they made their way to one of the ladders overhead. “I know you’re worried, but you gotta, I dunno…”

“Put it aside,” Ignis said. Gladio gave him a curious look.

“More like leave room for something else,” he said. He lifted a hand to Ignis’ cheek, and Ignis sighed. 

They emerged to find that it was already dusk, and a small crowd had gathered on the deck below the… main mast, Ignis recalled, from Regis’ hasty explanations. Noctis stood in the center of the crowd, standing with his hands on his hips, looking like a conquering king with no land to claim. 

“Good,” Gladio said. “It’s already started. Sit here and I’ll get you something to eat.”

Ignis climbed onto the barrels Gladio had indicated, examining Noct with interest. Noct was grinning, shoulders back, and he said something that made the crowd around him laugh and jostle each other. Cindy pushed through the crowd into the circle, and he put his hands up in fists, rocking back on his heels.

“Tension kills a ship.” Gladio spoke softly into Ignis’ ear as he collapsed beside him. He handed over a bowl of noodles, which were just hot enough to warm Ignis’ fingers through his gloves. “That’s where people like my dad and Noct come in. Dad can be a hardass, yeah, but he’s the one who sets up competitions, and he’s in the ship band. He knows that if people don’t put their feet up sometimes, it causes resentment. _What’re we here for if the officers get to sit in their fancy cabins while the rest of us work our asses off?_ That kind of thing.”

“And Noctis?” Ignis winced as Cindy pushed Noctis to the edge of the circle, swinging them round. Someone started to clap, and Noct ducked under Cindy’s waist to haul her over his shoulders. 

“Noct’s complicated,” Gladio said. “Sometimes, he’s the kind of lazy, entitled asshole regular sailors hate. But he has a good eye, and when you’re up against the enemy, you want him at your back. He _cares_ about people.”

“You piece of shit!” Noct shouted, as Cindy kicked him in the gut. Gladio chuckled.

“No, really.” The clapping was more rhythmic now, and when Cindy slipped off Noctis’ back, he bowed to her and offered his hand. She took it, and he swept her up in a ridiculous, scrambling excuse for a waltz. “People know where they stand with him. He ain’t dignified like the commander, but they’ll follow him if they have to.”

Ignis watched Gladio as he followed Noct and Cindy’s progress in what was quickly becoming an impromptu dance circle. Gladio’s expression reminded him of the look in the eyes of the rebels in the Scientia clinic. Not quite as worshipful, more fond than awed, but it was close. Ignis remembered the old stories of the Caelum line, how he would see elders bow to Regis in the streets of Galdin when he was very young. 

“He’s your prince,” Ignis said. In the circle, Cindy dipped Noct down close enough for a kiss, and he tapped her nose with his fingers. She dropped him to a roar of from the crowd. 

“Yeah,” Gladio said, as Prompto ran forward to drag a hysterically laughing Noctis to his feet. “Guess so.”

 

\---

 

Gladio was pleased to find that, after the first night Ignis spent watching Noctis make a fool of himself, the doctor was starting to venture out on his own. Prompto took him on a tour of the gun decks before Cor respectfully asked that he not disturb their daily drills, Noct managed to get Ignis up the rigging by about two meters before he lost his nerve, and other members of the crew started approaching him during off hours, when Ignis sat off to the side to watch the dancing or fighting competitions that were held on the quarterdeck. Gladio and Noct finally had four players for King’s Knight, and Ignis proved to be a sore loser with a vindictive streak wider even than Noct’s. 

Once, when Ignis had a little too much to drink, he’d even agreed to Cindy’s offer of joining her for a dance. Gladio stood shoulder-to-shoulder with Noct, and admired the way Ignis’ body moved, graceful and straight-backed, against the light of the oil lamps at their feet.

“That would be Ilia’s influence,” said a voice at his ear. Gladio jumped: He hadn’t heard the commander approach. His father was at Regis’ side, talking to one of the sailors about the grain supply, and thankfully couldn’t see the patches of red rising up Gladio’s neck. 

“Sir?”

Regis’ eyes crinkled in good humor. “His mother had a formal education in Tenebrae. She came from a minor noble house. Quite scandalous when she ran off with Ignis’ father to become a doctor. She said she didn’t miss the petty intrigue of court life, but she _did_ love to dance.”

Gladio turned back to Ignis, who had brought Cindy to a halt to whistling applause. One or two other men and women stepped forward, hands out, and Ignis laughed and shook his head. 

“Perhaps not _quite_ the same, though,” Regis said. “I suppose young Ignis just needs the right dance partner.”

“Sir?” Gladio choked, but Regis was already drifting off, accompanying Clarus to the crew who served as the ship band. Ignis broke through the crowd, sweat standing out on his neck, and grinned at Gladio and Noctis. 

“Goodness,” he said, sounding faintly breathless. “I haven’t danced like that since--”

Gladio kissed him, startling a hum of surprise from Ignis as he was tugged close. Noct groaned, Gladio could hear murmurs from the crowd at Ignis’ back, and Ignis deepened the kiss for the span of a breath before breaking away.

“Aw, _hell,_ ” muttered one of the men behind them. 

“What was that for?” Ignis asked.

“I dunno,” Gladio said, as Noct threw his hands up in despair beside him. “I think I might be in need of a dance instructor.”

While Noct and Prompto doubted the sincerity of this claim, Gladio and Ignis started with the best of intentions. Ignis had been placed in one of the cabins by the part of the ship where the officers’ quarters were, which was small but sparsely furnished enough that two people could move about without knocking into one another. Technically, he was meant to share it with Sania, but Sania’s notes were all kept in the closet of the infirmary, and she didn’t like to walk all the way across the ship when she had her midnight fits of inspiration. 

So that first night, Gladio stood dutifully still in Ignis’ room as Ignis moved his body into proper form. He felt deft hands adjust his posture, slide along the backs of his legs, lift his arms. When Ignis finally joined him, Gladio was dry-mouthed and trembling, and they made it little more than two steps before Ignis was propped up on his desk with Gladio’s mouth on his neck. 

That was alright, though. It meant they’d just have to try again the next night. 

And the next.

And the one after that.

Dinners with the commander and Clarus were only mildly awkward, if only because Noct distracted everyone from Ignis and Gladio exchanging sly looks by sulking darkly because Prompto wasn’t allowed to join them. This was made worse by Cor, who had unofficially adopted Prompto into the small circle of Cor’s chosen gunners, and was constantly bringing him up over dinner to go over the changes being made to their usual routine. Still, that didn’t stop Regis and Clarus from commenting on how Gladio and Ignis seemed to have made themselves scarce in the evenings, which made Gladio flush and Ignis’ face lock up in his expressionless mask.

The night before they were set to reach the peninsula, Gladio knew that Ignis would be a mess. So he snuck into Ignis’ rooms early, while Sania was still making him go over their inventory of sedatives. Gladio lit the candles in their sconces around the walls, made the bed, scraped dust into the hallway, and carefully set up a wine bottle in a basket by the desk.

When Ignis opened the door, he found Gladio sitting in his chair in the center of the room, legs crossed. He was in his dress uniform, all grey and black and silver, the fine chain that buttoned his vest hanging in criss-crossing loops. His hair was tied up, a silver clasp holding his ponytail back, and his boots shone with polish.

“I thought we might give it a proper go tonight,” Gladio said, his voice low in the stunned silence.

 

“Prom! You aren’t supposed to be up here!”

Prompto Argentum shrugged as he hauled himself over the railing of the crow’s nest, landing with a soft thump next to Noct. 

“Says who?” he asked. He bumped into Noct’s shoulder, smiling, and Noct folded like a deck of cards. The wind was strong that night, and while he normally hated to share watch with anyone, he supposed he wouldn’t mind it if it was _Prompto._ Prompto slipped a hand in his, and Noct smiled back. 

“We gotta keep an eye out, though,” Noct said. He started at the touch of Prompto’s lips at the back of his neck, and forced himself to keep his gaze on the water as Prompto trailed kisses up to the curve of his ear. 

“You watch the ocean,” Prompto said. His fingers slipped into Noct’s waistband. “I’ll watch you.”

“Oh my god, that was _awful._ ” Prompto snickered. “No, that was really, _really_ awful.”

“You love me anyways,” Prompto said. He pressed close against Noct’s back, and when his fingers trailed over the front of his briefs, Noct twisted slightly to look into his eyes. They were calm, level, dark against the moonlit sky. 

“Think so,” Noct said, and closed his eyes as Prompto’s fingers curled around his length, feather-light but sure, confident. Possessive.

 

_“Gladio.”_

For once, Ignis had been the first to break. Gladio’s pressed uniform was kicked under the desk, his undershirt rucked up as Ignis ran expert hands over his chest, twisting and pulling and dragging in turns to make Gladio cry Ignis’ name in a broken sob. Ignis felt the burn of stubble as he kissed Gladio, pressing him down to the clean, clean floor of his cabin. Gladio was shaking apart beneath him, desperate and panting, and Ignis smiled as he fumbled for the oil in his desk drawer. 

“Gods, Ignis,” Gladio said. His hair was a mess, finger-combed back so that it pooled about him on the floor. 

“I’m here,” Ignis said. His voice was soothing, but firm, and he placed a slick hand on Gladio’s hip. “Turn around, love.”

 

Noct turned unfocused eyes to the horizon. The stars were blurred spots in his vision as Prompto grinded against him, stroking his cock in time with his thrusts, pushing Noct up into the railing of the crow’s nest. Noct blinked, and caught the beginning of an evening mist rising up from the south-east. He tried to see shapes in the grey expanse, the way his father had taught him when he was young, but he could only feel Prompto’s hand on his cock, his hips on his ass, the heat of his breath.

“Don’t hold out on me, Noct,” Prompto whispered. “Come on. Come on, come on…”

 

When Ignis pressed into Gladio at last, he leaned over to dig his fingers in his thick, dark hair. “How are we?” he asked. Gladio closed his eyes, seemingly pleased just to have Ignis sheathed in him, kneading his hair in gentle strokes. “Gladio?”

“Ah.” Gladio rocked back, and Ignis’ grip tightened. “Ignis, you gotta… you can’t just leave me here…”

Ignis kissed him between the shoulder-blades and pulled back a mere two inches before thrusting forward again. Gladio grunted. 

“Harder, Ignis,” he gasped. “Please. _Please._ ”

He could never say no to that voice. Ignis set a rough pace that he knew he couldn’t keep. Gladio was too tight, too hot, moaning with every thrust as though he were about to come just from the feel of Ignis fucking into him. Ignis held onto Gladio’s hips, and Gladio’s fingers clenched on the polished wood of the floor. 

 

Noct held his fist to his mouth as he came, harder than he had in _years,_ by Prompto’s hand. He shuddered in the wake of it, pushing tears aside with trembling fingers, and turned to press his lips to Prompto’s in a sloppy kiss. 

“Gods, Prom,” he whispered, when they broke for air. “Gods, I…”

“There’s light,” Prompto said. Noct narrowed his eyes. 

“What?”

“In the fog.” Prompto gestured, and Noct turned to see a flicker of red in the mist that rolled over the water. “A light… but it doesn’t look like fire.”

“A distress flare, maybe.” Noct reached for the bell overhead, and stopped. The light flickered again, paused, and flashed a third time. It was a signal Noct had memorized early, but had never thought he’d see. A signal that only those trained by the Caelums knew to use. 

His fingers tightened around the cord of the bell.

 

Gladio held Ignis through his own release, arms locked tight around Ignis’ slender frame. He had rolled onto his back before Ignis had spent himself, biting down on his lip hard enough to break the skin, over his chest, and buried his face in Ignis’ neck as Ignis stroked him to completion. They lay there a moment, holding each other, Ignis looking wild-eyed and deliriously happy, as the bell for the end of the third watch rang. 

And kept ringing.

“That’s strange,” Ignis said. Gladio went stiff, and slipped out of Ignis’ arms. The slack look of pleasure was gone, replaced by the beginnings of something dangerously like panic. “Gladio? Why…?”

“It’s All Hands,” Gladio said. “Shit.” He searched for a washcloth, and Ignis ran for his dresser. Gladio’s old work clothes were pushed down to the bottom drawer just in case, and as Gladio cleaned himself off, Ignis handed him the garments one by one. No use putting on a dress uniform, Ignis knew. Not for this. 

They ran out onto the deck to find Clarus, Regis, and Cor already there, standing in a grim line before Noct and Prompto. Noct saw Gladio and nearly ran for him, then caught his father’s eye and slowed his pace to a quick trot. 

“It’s the signal for mutiny,” Noct said, pointing into the rapidly approaching mist to the south-east. “There’s a mutiny on the Glaive.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> STRAP IN, FOLKS


	11. Chapter 11

Glasses shone in the candlelight of Regis’ new dining quarters, reflecting the glitter of mirrors, glass frames, and crystal embellishments in the corners of the room. Under the table, Regis held his father’s crown, a silvery horn that looked like a branch of lightning. His fingers slid over its ridged surface, over and over, testing for a break. 

He unconsciously lifted his free hand towards the empty chair to his left, and stopped before anyone could catch the movement. Clarus, too perceptive for his own damn good, looked up from a quiet conversation with his wife and frowned at the empty setting. 

“Will we be expecting a coronation soon?” he asked. 

Regis, to his credit, didn’t flinch. The Scientias, sitting at the far end of the table, paused in the middle of a furious debate with Cor and Drautos over trade restrictions on Tenebrae. Weskham Armaugh, Regis’ old friend and advisor to his father, and Cid Sophiar, who could only be convinced to board a ship if he could see land through the window, watched Regis sharply.

“He doesn’t have to wear the blasted crown.” Titus Drautos, barely into his twenties, had the authority of a man on route to captaincy in his voice. “If he’s king, people won’t need a reminder.”

Regis’ fingers closed over the crown. 

“Well said, Titus.” He smiled as Drautos raised his glass in a silent toast. Cor caught on, and lifted his own glass.

“To His Majesty,” he said. “King Regis Lucis Caelum, the…”

“The one hundred and thirteenth,” Ilia Scientia said, when Cor’s face contorted in confusion. The others laughed, and light spotted their faces as they raised their glasses high. 

“To His Majesty,” they said, as one. 

Only Drautos didn’t speak. Regis watched him, smiling, as he downed the rest of his glass. 

“My friends,” Regis said. “I fear I don’t deserve you.”

 

\---

 

Alarm bells rang through the mist as the Crystal slowly brought itself in line with the tall, furled masts of the Glaive. Regis stood by the signal flags, a hand on the hilt of his sword, Clarus by his side, and watched the mist give way to the black smoke of gunpowder, and the shadows of people on deck. 

“We may have been too late,” Clarus said. There was no signal fire, no hurried movement. No sound of fighting. When they came close enough to see the Glaives signal flags, they read the code for “All well,” but Regis did not remove his hand from his sword. 

“Prepare to be boarded!” Gladio shouted. His voice was drowned in the mist and smoke. At the helm, Monica grimaced and drew the Crystal closer, alongside the Glaive. The black pits of the Crystal’s cannons stared out at the Glaive just as their boarding planks were raised: A warning. A promise.

“Well met!” Drautos. Regis strode forward, and Clarus fell into step beside him, gesturing for their riflemen and boarding team to follow. The crash of the boarding planks finding purchase on the other ship, and the creaking footsteps of the men and women as they crossed, sounded distant and muted. 

Drautos waited for them. He was bleeding from a cut on his cheek, and the men behind him looked ragged and worse for wear. Regis examined their faces. Luche, a young man who Regis had heard complain, more than once, that his fiance would never marry a man who couldn’t captain his own ship. He wore the markings of a lieutenant, hastily scrawled on his sleeve. A field promotion, it seemed. Then there was Axis, quiet and watchful, barely containing the disgust in his eyes. Tredd, thank the gods for Tredd, who couldn’t lie if he wanted to, was glaring openly from over Drautos’ shoulder. 

“It seems you didn’t need our help after all,” Regis said. To their right, a group of men and women were on their knees under guard. Regis could see Nyx there, Libertus at his back, while a young woman with dirty blonde hair gingerly lifted his left arm. Red, fresh burns twisted from his fingers to the charred shoulder of his sleeve, and when he looked to Regis, the pain in his eyes didn’t come only from the sting of the burn. 

“The signal fire wasn’t for you, Comma--” Nyx hissed as one of the guards pressed the blade of a sword to his throat. 

“As you can see,” Drautos said, “the mutiny has only _just_ been suppressed. We will have to kill them here if we are to have any hope of escorting the Tenebraeans to Altissia unhindered.”

The woman at Nyx’s side tensed. Regis raised his brows.

“I don’t believe I recognize a number of the sailors here,” he said, in a light voice. Drautos spat.  
“Nyx picked them. Showed me a message in your writing ordering us to depart early, and we needed more crew. It’s a damn shame that you have to see this, Regis. I would’ve thought better of my men.”

Waves thumped against the side of the Glaive with an echo of drums. Masts creaked and groaned overhead, the wind a live creature that teased the rolled canvas of their sails, twisted rigging with no bodies to weigh it down. Regis gazed at the strange woman at Nyx’s side before turning to Drautos with a rueful smile. 

He drew his sword.

“Let there be no lies between us, old friend.” Behind him, he heard the whistling of blades being drawn. “Not now.”

Drautos nodded. “As you say.”

There was the crack of a gunshot, a plume of smoke, and Clarus Amicita fell to his knees. 

Regis was aware of a second shot from his right, where his son’s new man stood with his rifle aimed and primed, a pale ghost in the smoke of gunpowder. He heard a strangled cry, the thump of boots on deck, blades slicing through flesh. Stepping over his lover’s body, Regis brought his sword down against Drautos’ blade. 

Another man would have asked for an explanation. Regis needed none. Drautos had betrayed his own men, had betrayed _him._ Betrayed the crown. There were days Regis could feel the weight of it even though it lay under glass in his study in Galdin, days when he considered tipping it into the grass and letting the earth take it, just as the earth had taken the ruins of the crown city. Now, with each jarring clash of his sword on Drautos’, Regis felt the rage of his legacy settle over his shoulders. Fury sharpened to a point, honed in over a century of exile, of watching their kingdom languish under the Empire. And here, here on the Glaive, on a ship that was _his,_ Regis had placed his hopes in the hands of a traitor. 

It was the rage of a king that put strength behind the blow that knocked Drautos back half a step. A king’s will that brought his sword twisting in short, mechanical movements, building up force with each strike. A king’s mercy that drove him to end this soon, for the sake of the young man Drautos had been, for the lie that was the brotherhood they’d shared. 

“Imperials to the South!” That was Nyx’s voice. Regis felt a smile twist against his bared teeth. 

“Your masters have come to call,” he said. Drautos shrugged and curved his sword under Regis’, trying to disarm him. Regis moved with him, slicing a red line over Drautos’ brow. 

“Better them,” Drautos said, “than a man who clings to a title he has to right to, who lets his men _rot_ in Imperial prisons while he plays at being king.”

“And you lick the heel of the boot at your throat,” Regis said. “They will use you, Titus. Use you and discard you.”

Drautos laughed, high and desperate, and Regis paused, sword raised. Then Drautos darted to the side, towards the leg that creaked in poor weather and could never move fast enough for Regis’ liking, and brought his blade home.

Regis heard a shout as he fell, hoarse and young, a voice that broke and wavered against the roaring in Regis’ ears as Drautos pushed his body free, and his sword clattered to the damp wood of the deck.

 

\---

 

There was a hand on Noctis’ shoulder. It was a familiar hand, calloused and large enough to hold him in place on its own, tickled by the ends of tattooed feathers. But all Noct could see was the patch of blood, black in the darkness, spreading over his father’s chest as he fell. He could only see Drautos, stepping back with pearls of blood rolling down the edge of his sword. 

He wrenched out of Gladio’s grip and ran for his father. 

The deck behind him vibrated with the force of Gladio’s pursuit, but Noctis didn’t care. He had his sword at the ready even as he passed the shaking, shuddering form of his father, even as Drautos raised his eyebrows in surprise and shifted his grip on the sword that had struck Regis down. 

Noct’s boots slid as he forced himself into a defensive stance. Drautos sighed. Yet as his sword rose, Noct fell back, pushed to his knees by the heavy weight of a shoulder slamming into his chest. 

Gladio brought his sword up to meet Drautos’, and his knees bent under the blow. 

“Get the king to the doctor!” Gladio’s bellow fell flat amid the clash of swords and crack of gunshots, but Noct had heard it. His gaze rose to the inked bird on Gladio’s back. Sure, Gladio teased him about being a Caelum often enough with taunts of being _prince charmless_ , but it had always been just that. A joke. Nothing real. But here Gladio was, saying _king_ as though the word came easy to his tongue, placing himself between Noct and a blade. 

Just like an Amicitia. Just like a _Shield._

Hands lifted Regis to his feet. Noct rose with them, but Drautos was still bearing down on Gladio, the fight was still thick on the Glaive, and he couldn’t afford to leave. He looked to the man who held Regis in his arms. 

“Don’t let him die,” he said, and slid to Gladio’s side, sword dull in the clouded moonlight. 

Even with Gladio and Noct fighting together, Drautos had decades of experience and desperation behind him, and they found themselves being pushed back against the rail of the Glaive. Gladio had a gash across his chest already, bleeding sluggishly into the hem of his trousers, and Noct’s bones rattled with every strike of Drautos’ sword on his. 

He caught a flash of yellow out of the corner of his eye. Prompto?

Gladio shouted, wordless and loud, and Drautos’ gaze fixed on him with heightened concern. Then fingers gripped Drautos’ neck from behind, and Nyx Ulric, holding a knife in his burned hand, plunged the blade into the flesh of Drautos’ shoulder and cried, “Luna, now!”

Drautos stiffened as a young woman, blonde hair flying in her eyes, thrust a sword into his side. She braced her foot on his hip to yank it free, and as Drautos twisted towards her, Noct stepped in front of Gladio and drew the edge of his sword along the traitor’s throat.

It took a minute for Drautos to die. Noct watched the blood pool at his feet, and it wasn’t until he felt a hand shaking his shoulder that he realized Gladio had been speaking. 

“They’re almost on us!” he shouted. “This isn’t the time!”

Noct narrowed his eyes. Behind Drautos, Nyx Ulric stumbled to his hands and knees. The blonde woman ran to him and pushed him up by the chest. 

“Noct! Are you listening?”

The mist was starting to clear. The sails of an Imperial man of war were in full view, too close for them to turn back in time. Noct fought to break out of the terror of watching Clarus collapse on the deck, of seeing his father run-through, and counted the masts. 

“I know this ship,” he said. The blonde, Luna, heaved Nyx to his feet, and glanced back at the approaching ship. Her lips thinned, and her hand tightened around Nyx’s shoulder. 

“So do I,” she said. Her voice was clear, and the look in her eyes held no fear, no hesitation. It reminded Noct of the face Ignis wore, sometimes, when his moods shifted and he became a quiet, expressionless statue. Luna turned her cold gaze to Noct, and he suppressed a shudder. “It’s my brother. Ravus Nox Fleuret, commander of the Titan.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> OK first of all:
> 
> Only Drautos died in this chapter (and a number of nameless people, okay). Hang in there!
> 
> Also, the fight ended up being a bit complicated, so I have to split it into two parts. Sorry for the cliffhanger!


	12. Chapter 12

Clarus was dragged into the infirmary under protest, bleeding a soggy mess into his brown leather jerkin and insisting that he was needed above. His voice echoed off the infirmary walls, and he had to be forced from turning back on shaking legs. 

“Regis is taking him on alone,” he said, as Sania instructed the men holding him to lay him out on the floor. “Damn fool.”

“The commander will be _fine,_ honey,” Sania said. She was busy tending to a woman who lost three fingers in an accident on the gun deck, so Ignis was the one who had to cut Clarus’ jerkin open. 

“Not without… Damn, boy.” He winced when Ignis sliced through his shirt with a knife. There were fibers stuck in the wound, and the bullet was lodged deep. “Warn a man next time.”

Ignis smiled thinly. “My apologies. I’ll need to make an incision to extract the bullet properly. We do have poppy on hand…” He watched Clarus carefully. Too much opium, despite its use in dulling pain, could prove more dangerous than the wound that called for it. Clarus shook his head.

“Can’t,” he said. “Need to stay clear.”

Ignis could see where Gladio got his bull-headed determination from. He clicked his teeth and retrieved a thick leather strap for Clarus to bite down on in lieu of his tongue, and unrolled a fresh strip of knives.

He was in the process of clamping down on the ball lodged dangerously close to Clarus’ lungs when the man jumped. “Hold him _down,_ ” Ignis ordered, without looking up. “Gods’ sakes, hold him _down_ or I will _strap_ him down.” 

Hands came into view, gripping Clarus’ arms on one side, his waist on the other. One of his assistants was trembling.

“Sir,” she said. “It’s just…”

“Not now.” Clarus twitched, and Ignis struggled to keep his expression level. “I _will_ go for the poppy, sir.”

“Damn the poppy.” Clarus had spat out the gag. Ignis looked up to find his eyes wild, darting from one side of the infirmary to Ignis, then back again. Ignis leaned around his assistant to the flurry of activity going on behind her. 

Sania knelt before Regis, who was a ruin of blood at the entrance of the infirmary. His skin was unnaturally pale, shiny with sweat, and his eyes had rolled to show the blood-shot whites as Sania stripped off his shirt and barked orders. 

“He’s in good hands,” Ignis said. Clarus made to argue, and Ignis pressed on his forehead, keeping him down. “And he will be in _mine_ as soon as I finish here.”

“An Amicitia,” Clarus choked out. “Has always…”

Ignis removed his hand from Clarus’ bald crown, and held back a grimace at the bloodstain that remained. “Stay by his side a moment longer, sir,” he said, and, with the strength of his assistants holding him steady, retrieved his tools once more. 

 

\---

 

Noct stared at the ship cleaving through the mist. 

“Right,” he said. Gladio could barely hear him. “Right. Right, okay. Nyx, you—“ Noct looked Nyx up and down. “Who do you trust?”

Nyx twisted round. With Drautos fallen, the men and women loyal to him had folded, and either lay on the decks of the ship in pieces, or were being shackled by the hollow-eyed sailors they’d thought to kill not minutes before. The ship stank of blood and smoke, and Gladio saw more than one sailor from the Crystal among the dead. 

“Crowe,” Nyx croaked. “Libertus. Pelna.”

“Crowe’s a good helmsman,” Noct whispered. He strode forward, into the midst of the exhausted crew. “This ship,” he shouted, his voice thin, “is under Caelum control. Anyone who has objections? You know me. You know my _father._ So you know I’m not fucking around when I say I will _personally_ take you, and your objections, into the hold in fucking _chains._ Where’s Crowe?”

Crowe raised an arm. She was smiling, foot on the neck of a cursing and shackled Tredd. “Yeah?”

“You’re at the helm. The Glaive will intercept the Titan in a T formation. The Crystal will go alongside it.” He pointed among a few of the Crystal’s crew. “You, you, and you four are gonna join the Glaive’s gun crew. Libertus!” 

“Sir?” Like Crowe, Libertus was smiling. Gladio had a feeling that they’d laugh at anything at this point, and a suddenly authoritative Noct was reason enough. 

“You’re in charge. Pelna, you’re his first. We’ll push through. If this goes right, we’ll have a new man-of-war in our hands.”

“Two,” said Prompto, limping up to Noct. Blood ran down the side of his left leg. “Two man-of-wars.” He pointed. Through the mist, they could just see a second set of masts behind the Titan, too close in line to see properly at first. Gladio turned to Noct, but Noct was wearing a vague, detached look, as though he were seeing this all through a different set of eyes.

“Too late to run,” he muttered. “ _Two_ ships!” he shouted. “Eyes on the signal flags! Use your chain shots if you got em. The rest of you, back to the Crystal.”

“Your highness,” one of the sailors said, and ran across the boards. 

“Highness,” said another. One by one, like wind shushing through the high reeds of the marshes beyond Duscae, the word ran through the gathered crew. _Highness. Highness._ Noct’s mouth hardened, and he nodded to the sailors of the Glaive before heading back to the Crystal. 

“Gods,” he whispered, when Gladio caught up with him. “I hope we’re doing the right thing.”

“Hey! Noctis!”

Noct groaned and spun on his heel. Nyx and Luna had followed them on board. Luna was whispering to Nyx, soft and fast, a hand on his chest to support him. Noct saw Drautos’ former first mate clench his bad hand, the wiry network of burns standing out on his skin.

“You should go down and get that looked at,” he said. “How’d that even—“

“He grabbed the signal flare,” Luna said, with a pointed glare at Nyx. Nyx shrugged. “Noctis. I am Lunafreya—“

“Nox Fleuret. I guessed. I’m sorry, your highness, but we need to _run the signal flags to intercept the Leviathan, Gladio._ ”

“Got it.” Gladio turned to go. Behind him, he heard Luna appeal to him again.

“I know my brother. If he knows I’m on board, he’ll hold his fire.”

“You sure about that?”

Gladio watched them as he strung up the flags. The Glaive was already starting to swing round, baring her side—and her newly manned gun deck—to the fore of the Titan. 

“Take Nyx to Ignis,” Noct shouted, as Gladio tied the flags in place. Gladio nodded and came over to take Nyx’s weight off Luna’s shoulders. She touched Nyx’s cheek, fingers brushing over the small arrow tattoo on his forehead. 

“I’d tell you not to do anything stupid,” Nyx said, “if I’d think you’d listen.”

“Look at you, Nyx Ulric,” said the princess. “You already know me so well.”

“We don’t have much time,” Noct said. He took Luna’s arm. “If you’re right, I have a plan, but it’s risky. Head straight up when you’re done, Gladio. I need you with me.”

Gladio nodded and hobbled off with Nyx, dragging him away from Noct and Luna and into the madness of the decks below. 

 

“Patient for you,” Gladio said, shoving Nyx into the crowded infirmary. Nyx glared back at him and flipped him a rude gesture with his good hand.

“Mr. Amicitia.” Ignis’ voice was clipped, and he didn’t even look up from the man he was tending to. “If you do not _lie_ down and stop tearing your stitches, I wil tie you to a cot and leave you there until they heal.”

Gladio whistled low, and Ignis’ head shot up. “Oh,” he said. He looked from Gladio to Nyx, and flushed. “Oh, I… I see. My apologies, Gladio, I thought you were—”

“My father?” Gladio looked down at the man Ignis was attending to. It took him some time to recognize Regis’ face in the ashen, sweating man who lay limp under Ignis’ care. There was a pile of filthy, bloodstained rags at Ignis’ side, but his hands were already stained again, and the wound in Regis’ side looked too ragged to stitch together.

“Insubordination,” groaned a voice from the corner. Gladio looked over, and saw his father lying with his back to the wall, watching them. Like Regis, his face had gone grey, and spots of blood stood out over the heavily-wrapped bandages over his upper chest and shoulder. 

Gladio didn’t spare a thought for how quickly he ran to his father’s side. He reached for his hand, which lay slack on the floor beside him. “Dad, how are… you and the commander…”

Clarus gave him a weary look. “That doctor of yours,” he said, in a low, labored voice, “has the bedside manner of a daemon. Can’t fault him for skill, though.”

“You know you’re shit with doctors, Dad.” Gladio couldn’t help the laugh that bubbled out of him. “How’s the commander?”

“In the hands of the gods,” Clarus said. He wouldn’t look away from Regis’ face. “I’ve never seen him lose this much blood, not since he took that blow to the thigh when we were your age.”

“He’ll be fine,” Gladio said, ignoring the sweat that stood out on Regis’ forehead, and the way his father’s hands shook. “Leave the Crystal to us for now.”

Clarus’ eyes narrowed dangerously. “Son—“

“Don’t worry.” He stood, trying to lend confidence to his voice from a wellspring of adrenaline and fear. “Noct has a plan.”

 

\---

 

The Crystal slowly eased its way through the midnight waters off the Tenebraean sea, desperate to block off the front of the Glaive before the Leviathan came within firing distance. The deck crawled with sailors, and the helmsman stepped down to allow the young, dark-haired son of the commander to take over. 

Noctis’ hands gripped the spokes of the wheel, muscles standing out against his thin black shirt as he turned. Behind him, Gladio relayed his orders, occasionally running down to lower decks to see them carried through, but always returning to Noct’s side. Once Prompto, a bloody bandage wrapped around his leg, ran up to say that Cor’s gun crew was ready to fire on command, Noct gave Gladio a terse nod. Gladio bellowed out an order, and the Glaive, facing the Titan head-on, fired two shots into the sea. 

The flags of Niflheim and Accordo were already down. The old flag of Tenebrae, unused since before the fall of the old Queen, was raised in full view, unfurling slowly. As the Crystal tacked into position, a young woman stepped out of the hold, walking across the deck. She was wearing a white dress, bright even in the cloud and mist, and her long hair was unpinned and flying loose about her face. She stopped before Noctis, and placed a hand on the double-spoked wheel. Then she held out a hand to Gladio, who took it, and she heaved herself up onto the wheel itself. Gladio lunged to keep her upright, and her dress obscured his vision, billowing in a high wind. 

The Titan did not respond. There was a shout from the Glaive, and two more warning shots. Luna swayed, feet slipping on the polished wood of the wheel, and Noct grabbed one of her legs with one hand. 

Then the Leviathan, which was barely pulling alongside the Crystal, open fired. 

Luna dropped into Gladio’s arms as the gun decks facing the Leviathan came to life. She braced herself on his shoulder, his arms around her knees, turned to the Titan. 

“Ravus,” she said. Noct squinted at the flags that peeked out through the sails of her brother’s ship, lips moving as he tried to work out the code. “Ravus, please.”

“Sorry, highness,” Noct said. Gunfire made the boards of the deck rattle and shake. “The order to fire came from his ship. Gladio.”

Gladio nodded, set Luna down, and went to their own signals. There were bright spots of pink on Luna’s cheeks, and she ran forward in the eerie silence of guns being reloaded, soft-soled shoes thumping. 

“Ravus Nox Fleuret!” She shouted. Gladio was impressed—someone had taught her how to make her voice carry. From the Glaive, Gladio could hear Crowe, passing the call along.

_Ravus Nox Fleuret!_

“Lapdog of the Emperor!” 

Noct gave Gladio a gleeful look as Crowe’s voice cried out again, echoing through the smoke. 

_Lapdog of the— of the— of the Emperor!_

“We should keep her around,” Noct said. Gladio gave the Glaive the signal to fire at will, and the prow of the Titan became a flurry of splinters and shredded rigging. 

On the Crystal’s port side, Gladio heard a sickening crack as a cannonball hit the base of their mizzenmast head-on. The mast groaned and held, but he knew that a second strike would bring it down. Sailors scrambled down the rigging and tried to secure ropes to guide its descent should it fall. The Titan was inching its way to its side: If the Glaive didn’t prevent it from turning, its superior cannon power would make short work of their under-manned crew. As it was, the Crystal was taking a beating from the Leviathan—Two sails were already shredded beyond repair, and a fire had broken out one of the lower gun rooms. 

That’s when Gladio heard it: Shouting, faint but clear, beyond the wide, polished bulk of the Leviathan. He stared into the gloom.

“Noctis,” Gladio said. 

“I know it looks bad!” Noct shouted.

“Noct, we’re fucked. We need to surrender.”

“To the Empire?” Noct had that bright look in his eyes, the one Gladio had seen in the commander once or twice, when Gladio’s fear of the man had overridden respect and sent him into silence. But this wasn’t Regis: This was Noctis, and Gladio wouldn’t be cowed.

“If not to them, then to him,” Gladio said, pointing. Noct, with his keen eye, spotted it immediately: White masts, breaking through the fog.

“Shit,” he whispered. 

The Scourge had come like a carrion crow scenting death, and its decks swarmed with movement. 

“Surrender,” Noctis said. “We can’t—we can’t beat all of them. We can’t even beat _two._ If he’s working with the Empire—”

Gladio hauled at the rope tethered to the flag of Tenebrae, dragging it down. Luna, moving to Noct’s side, narrowed her eyes. “I don’t understand,” she said. “If he’s working for the Empire, where are their colors?”

Gladio’s hands fumbled with the white flag in its box as the Scourge, drawing even on the Leviathan’s other side, fired on the Imperial warship.

“The fuck,” Noct said. They stood in shocked silence for all of half a second, before Noct raised his hands in the air. “Fine!” He gripped the wheel. “Yeah! Whatever! I guess we’re joining up with the fucking Scourge!” 

“Why the hell not?” Gladio asked him. Noct’s teeth bared in a mirthless grin.

“Fuck if I know!” Noct shouted back. “’S not like _I’m_ in charge!”

 

With the Glaive firing on the Titan at the Crystal’s side, and the Crystal and the Scourge flanking the Leviathan, the battle was, for the first time since it began, starting to turn in their favor. The Leviathan was trying to sail through, but the wind was against them, and the best they could do was twist the ship at an angle, attempting to sail around the Scourge on the other side. The Glaive was running out of ammunition: They’d resorted to firing nails, bits of chain, and any other scraps of metal that could wreck the Titan’s sails and rigging. Bells were ringing on the Titan’s deck, low and almost lost amid the crack and roar of cannon-fire.

Noctis, facing the rudder, had a clear view of the Scourge’s signals through a gap in the Leviathan’s sails. They were switching the flags in a pattern Noct recognized from the Imperial code-books, and he called Gladio over to point them out.

“The Scourge is saying something about joining the fleet,” he said. “That us?”

Gladio looked to the Titan, but their flags were hidden. “Why use Niflheim’s code?”

“Right,” Noct said. “When we’re done here, let’s just sink the Scourge and go home, yeah?”

They didn’t get the chance. The Titan was retreating, and the Leviathan had already turned so that its gun decks were almost parallel to the Scourge’s. They fired half-heartedly upon one another, but as the Titan slowly wheeled about, Noct and Gladio saw the signals. 

They were a mirror image of the ones flying from the Scourge’s deck. 

Noct swore. “Tell the Glaive to retreat.”

“Noct, the Leviathan’s half wrecked.”

“Yeah? And if there’s a fleet?” Noct jerked his head at the Titan. “Ravus isn’t going far. I’m not about to let us get boxed in by the Imperial fucking Navy. Sound. The. Retreat. Gladio.”

Gladio gave him a low bow. “Your _Majesty._ ”

“Do I look like I’m wearing a fucking crown to you?” Noct shouted, as Gladio stalked off down the deck. Next to the wheel, Luna turned from them both, watching the Scourge shift to face the Crystal.

“They’re signaling you,” she said to Noct, who growled and dragged the wheel around.

“Yeah,” he said, keeping his gaze on the exposed ports of the Scourge’s gun deck. “I bet they are.”

 

\---

 

Ignis’ vision swam. The difficulty with working in the infirmary, he’d found, was that the heat of so many bodies pressed together fogged his glasses every minute. In the end, he had to hook them into the button of his shirt and make do with squinting. 

Regis was proving difficult. It wasn’t just that Ignis could feel the weight of Clarus’ gaze on him as he worked—though that certainly didn’t help. But Regis had been struck just above the belly, casting him into the uncertain space between a doomed man and someone who, in time, would have an impressive scar in his abdomen with a tendency to ache when it rained. As Ignis cleaned his hands for what felt like the hundredth time, he looked up to meet Clarus’ eyes. His expression was level despite the bone-deep weariness in the slump of his shoulders, and Ignis’ hands clenched on the ruined rag.

He'd been thirteen the first time a man died on his watch. When Ignis had peeled back the tightly-buttoned collar of the soldier’s jacket to find the mess beneath, he knew that it was only a matter of time. No one survived a cut to the belly, not when it dug through the intestines and fouled the blood. The most Ignis could do, he knew, was to make the man comfortable. 

His mother had turned to him just as the first tears began to fall, and ushered Ignis into the back of the tent. She crouched between him and the opening, and hurriedly pushed his tears aside, too light to redden his skin. 

“No, little man,” she said, and held him by the shoulders. “You have to put that away. Do you understand?” When he simply looked up at her, she rubbed his shoulders. “Outside that tent is a man who carried your patient four miles over enemy lines to die. He can’t see you lose control now, because it means he’ll think you lost control when his man was under your care. He’ll think he died in pain.”

“But he _did,_ ” Ignis whispered.

“We need to put ourselves aside, Ignis,” his mother told him. “It sounds cold, but right now, it’s that man outside who needs comfort. You’ll find yours after, when it’s done. Can you do that?”

Ignis nodded. 

“Alright, little man. Take a deep breath in. Hold. Hold. Deep breath out. Deep breath in…”

With Regis’ wounds newly stitched and his pallid skin clammy to the touch, Ignis leaned down and slid a hand under the back of the commander’s head. He could hear people moving around him, and part of him registered that the thunder of cannons had died away to be replaced by furious shouting, but all he could see was the slight parting of Regis’ lips, the rise and fall of his chest. 

_Deep breath in,_ said the ghost of Ilia Scientia, as the Crystal wheeled about in the dark, alive with smoke and blood and the smell of burning flesh. Regis’ breath came out harsh and rasping. _Hold. Deep breath out…_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> WHEW
> 
> So!  
> That was fun! I'm going to be out on a trip for the next few days, but the next part is on the way. You won't have to wait too long. Thank you for all your support!


	13. Chapter 13

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This one is rather short! After my vacation was done, I was struck with a horrible case of writer's block in regards to this fic. Which is funny, because I actually got to see a real pirate flag from the golden age of piracy while I was away.

“All we require.” The words echoed, taking a new shape as they rolled over waves and thrummed against the beams of the Queen’s Crystal. “Is the princess!”

Ardyn Izunia, captain of the Scourge, drummed his fingers on his thighs as the Crystal drifted, silent and laden with enough guns to rival an Imperial vessel, through the mist and smoke. He’d given them plenty of time to consider his terms, and still no whistles sounded, no flags raised, no voices called out over the water. The Glaive was already trying to limp behind the Crystal’s bulk, and Ardyn could see the small figure of the commander at the helm.

The _very_ small figure, come to think of it.

“I said,” Ardyn bellowed, his voice booming across the sea, “All we require is the princess!”

A single note rang out on the deck of the Crystal. A bell? He’d heard of the Caelums using bells rather than whistles to give orders, but this was his first chance at seeing it in the flesh. 

A single flag rose from behind the wheel. Death? No, Ardyn thought. Surely not. 

Someone cried out, but the sound was lost in the creak and groan of the ship turning slowly into the wind. They called again. 

“Come get her!”

A small life raft crashed into the water. Ardyn took a step closer to the rail, and saw a man standing over the raft, holding a body in his arms. 

White cloth flapped in the breeze, stained with a red so deep that it looked like the waist of the dress had been dipped in the dark of the sky. The man on the Crystal let the body drop, and there was no flail of limbs, no struggle to break the fall as the white-clad corpse of Her Highness, Princess Lunafreya Nox Fleuret, leader of the rebellion against the Niflheim Empire and darling of Tenebrae, landed in the raft with a sickening thud. 

 

\---

 

“For goodness’ sake,” Lunafreya said, wrapping a tarp around her shoulders. “You’d think you’ve never seen a woman’s bare shoulders before.”

The princess sat behind a tangle of downed ropes, great swathes of torn sails, and a chunk of wood that had been taken out of the railing opposite. Her bare legs slid out of the folds of the tarp, and the young men around her turned around, suddenly vitally interested in their work.

Cindy whistled. 

“A shame about Jules,” Gladio said, watching their smallest raft go bobbing into the current behind them. The Scourge was lowering life boats already, and the crew on board the Crystal were frantic in their efforts to get as much space between themselves and the Scourge before it was revealed that the body wearing Lunafreya’s dress did not, in fact, belong to the princess. “He deserved a better send-off.”

“We didn’t have time,” Noct snapped. “Gladio, I need you to check on Dad. Can you—“

“I’ll go,” Luna said. She stood, shedding the tarp, and Gladio looked up at the mast. “Oh, for…”

“Here, honey,” Cindy said, swinging an arm around her waist. “Let’s find you something nice.”

 

Ignis ran out of clean rags by the time the fire in one of the gun rooms had been put out, and it didn’t look like any new ones were forthcoming. In an act of desperation, he took off his shirt and sliced it expertly along the seams. Sania applauded, and immediately started digging through her own stash of clothes for future bandages in the making.

They had a sizable pile by the time Ignis saw her.

Her hair was longer, smudged with soot and reaching her mid-back. She was wearing trousers that fit a little too loose, and she had on a thin grey shirt that made her skin seem bloodless and pale. Her cornflower blue eyes were sharp in the dark, and her gaze stopped on Ignis. 

“I’m here to see the commander,” she said. 

“He’s stable, your highness,” Ignis told her, and gave her as much of a bow as he could while still seated. Princess Lunafreya smoothed her lips into a practiced smile. He wanted to protest when she knelt on the bloodstained floor, but Lunafreya didn’t seem to notice. She laid a hand an inch over Regis’ mouth, testing his breathing. 

“What is your name, hero?” she asked. Confused—surely she knew the commander’s name—Ignis looked up. She watched him, gaze level, and waited.

“Your highness,” he said. “I’m not—“

“You bear the mark of one,” Lunafreya said. Ignis raised his fingers to the brand on his arm. “What else am I to call you?”

In that moment, Ignis would have gladly walked through Ifrit’s fires for her a thousand times over. “Ignis,” he said. “Ignis Scientia.”

“Well met, Ignis Scientia,” the princess said. Ignis bowed his head, and she leaned forward, pressing a kiss to his brow. “Loyal son of Tenebrae.”

 

\---

 

That night, Noctis held a meeting in his father’s quarters. 

He sat in the seat next to the commander’s empty chair, rolling his father’s signet ring in his palms. Prompto Argentum sat a little ways behind him, on a box of blank maps, and Gladio and Cor took the chairs closest to Noctis. Lunafreya brought Nyx with her, who looked ashen but otherwise hale, and Sania and Ignis filed in late, exhaustion heavy in their eyes. 

“So,” Noctis said. The ring bit into his hand as he pressed down on it, and Gladio could see an indentation of the crystal at its center, pink against the pale flesh. “Ardyn has to know that wasn’t her highness by now.”

The room was silent. He looked to Gladio, who only shook his head and crossed his arms. 

“Our safest bet is to make it back to Galdin,” Noctis said, “until we can find a way to get her highness,” he glanced at Luna, who nodded. “Back to Altissia. We’re, well. We’re fucked if we try it now.”

“We can’t handle a second battle,” Cor said. “Not enough ammunition, and the fire took out some of my best crew.”

“So we’ll need to keep constant watch,” Noct said. “No one knows what Ardyn’s planning. What the _Empire_ is planning. But they know we have Luna, so…” He rolled the ring again, and Gladio frowned. 

“You gonna put that on, Noct?”

Cor stiffened. Noct stopped, closing his hand. “My dad’s still commander, Gladio.”

“For now,” Sania said. Noctis turned to her, eyes narrowed dangerously, and Ignis jumped in. 

“She means,” he said, “that he’s in no condition to _take_ command.”

Noct stood. “Not yet, anyways,” he said, and dropped the ring on the table. It rolled to its side, dull and small against the worn wood. “We’re just gonna… keep the ship safe for him until he can.” He looked to each of them in turn, his gaze flicking past Gladio too quickly for comfort. “I’ll be depending on all of you to get us through this,” he said. 

There was a murmur of assent, and Noctis placed both hands on the table. They were trembling slightly, and he pushed down, joints popping. “I’m sorry,” he said, and Gladio hummed under his breath. “I’ll need a minute with… To get acquainted with Dad’s things. We can start again in the morning.”

No one mentioned that the sun was already starting to rise. They left him with awkward, murmured goodbyes, filing into the gold light of dawn. Lunafreya lingered at the door, a hand on Nyx’s shoulder, but Noctis was too busy staring down at his father’s ring of command, twisting it in his fingers and setting it to spin, over and over, the light of its crystal winking on the tabletop.


	14. Intermission: Where in the World is Iris Amicitia?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just taking a small break from the main plot to let you know what Iris has been up to while all this drama has been going on. It isn't necessarily relevant to the story; Just a little something extra thrown in for fun.

**Being an Account of the Life of Iris Amicitia, Captive of Shiva’s School For Ladies of Quality, M. E. 755**

_Day 453._

Dear Diary,

Master Armaugh, the fencing instructor for class 3B, says that I have the most potential out of any student in our year. Ha! I didn’t spend the first ten years of my life hitting Noct and Gladio with a wooden sword just to show up on my first day of lessons and lose to the likes of someone like Loren, or Marge. Who, as you know (I can’t believe I’m talking to a _diary,_ like it’s a _person_. How far I’ve fallen) are what Gladdy would call assholes of the tenth degree. They think that just because I like embroidery and Persephone wears makeup, and because I know how to _talk_ to people without constantly going on about how I’m not like _most_ girls (what does that even mean?) we’re just a couple of brown-nosers. Shows what they know. 

I’m also due for detention next week with Professor Tifa. But she laughed the whole time Seph told her about Loren getting shoved in the fountain, so I think it’ll be okay. 

P.S. Seph says that she’s willing to help with Operation Rip-tide if I give her the moogle doll I was gonna give to Noct for his birthday. Score! 

P.P.S. Sorry, Noct.

_Day 457._

Fuck fuck fuck fuck  
Shit  
Damn  
Fuck!

How was I supposed to know the headmistress keeps _dogs_ guarding the perimeter of the garden sheds? Why do you need dogs to guard a bunch of fertilizer and pitchforks? What’s her deal? Why is she so paranoid?

Seph says she _tried_ to sound the alarm when she saw the dobermans, but that doesn’t matter when you’re ripping your brother’s old trousers on barbed wire trying to get _away!_

Damn it! I’ll have to wait a week and go with the old Bedsheets As A Rope trick. I swore I wouldn’t do it, but desperate times…

_Day 465._

No news from Dad or Mr. Regis. Or Gladdy. Or Noct. Okay, Noct never writes unless Gladdy forces him to, but I’m that sick of this place. Gladdy was out on the ocean when he was, what? Five? Six? But no, because I’m a _girl,_ I have to wait until I’m _sixteen._

I can’t wait that long. I’ll _die._ Sixteen is _ancient._ Sixteen is when you have to take mandatory etiquette classes and figure out how corsets work and scream internally for the rest of your life. Sixteen is when everything’s _over._

I told Seph, and she agrees. We’re getting out. Both of us. I know Seph’s serious, because she stopped looking at the assistant fencing instructor for all of ten seconds to say so. And that’s impressive, because when Mr. Cloud (oh my god, I’m serious, _that’s his real name_ ) walks in, Seph starts glaring like she’s about to _kill_ something. I don’t know if this means she hates him or likes him. It’s hard to tell with Seph, sometimes.

Oh! And Master Armaugh moved me up to the second class in fencing! I pulled off three disarming moves in a row, and he’s talking about maybe fitting in extra lessons around detention. 

Heck yeah!

_Day 470._

The bedsheet plan sucks. It sucks for a reason. Silk sheets are _not_ strong enough to carry the weight of two teenageers. Seph broke her arm and I’m under _watch._ They say they’re sending a letter home to Dad, but good luck with _that_ one.

Master Armaugh tells me that I need to work on my temper. He says I need to think things through first. Which is funny, because adults shouldn’t talk like they want to _help_ kids run away. 

Right?

P.S. Seph is horrible. She doesn’t blame me, but I drew feathers on her cast as a joke, and now she keeps calling herself a “one-winged angel,” and I’m gonna push _her_ in the fountain soon enough.

_Day 500._

Still no news. This isn’t normal. This _isn’t_ normal. Dad said they were supposed to be back in Galdin by now because they had some sort of rendezvous with the Glaive, but so far? Nothing. 

If I don’t hear anything else in a week, I’m leaving. Seph or no Seph.

_Day 509._

This is it. Seph says she’s tricking Mr. Cloud into opening the west gate for us, and I bribed the postman into letting us hitch a ride on her way back to Galdin. It’s happening _tonight._

Just try and stop me.


End file.
